


To Save the Realm

by mgsmurf



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Brothers Lannister, Canon Compliant, Canon Continuation, Canon deaths, F/M, Gen, Jaime died, Multiple personality Bran, The mystery of the pregnancy that may and may not be, Three-Eyed Raven as king, Time Travel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-12
Updated: 2020-06-23
Packaged: 2020-06-26 23:28:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 6
Words: 27,118
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19778683
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mgsmurf/pseuds/mgsmurf
Summary: Ser Brienne of Tarth serves as Lady Commander of the new King Bran's kingsguard. She grieves Jaime, makes a friend in Tyrion and learns how to live within the political landscape of the King's Landing. But, more and more the king's actions and words make her question who and what he is and is capable of. Did the Three-Eyed Raven use his knowledge to manipulate everyone into making him king, into giving him the realm to use? Did he play a role in Jaime's death, at the least by not preventing it, at the worst by driving Jaime from the warmth and love of Brienne's arms to his death? Now she must decide if she can break her vows to the crown to save the realm from the Three-Eyed Raven. With Tryion as her ally they use the powers of the remaining Children of the Forest to travel back in time and prevent the Battle of King's Landing and the power vacuum left from it. Can they prevent an all powerful, mostly omnipotent and manipulative creature from controlling the realm. If Brienne must, can she chose between Jaime the man she loves and has been reunited with and saving the realm from a monster?





	1. Realizations

**Author's Note:**

> This is a canon continuation, meaning that Jaime died, the rest of the end of season 8 happened as we saw. While this fic is not exactly a fix-it, it does have Jaime/Brienne at the heart of it and Jaime will not be dying again. Although, as it continues from the end of the series there will be only Brienne for a good chunk of the first of this, possibly 5 or so chapters depending, just know I will get to Jaime and JB in all its glory (note the rating). This is also not for Bran-stans if they exist as he is not going to play in the best light. I currently have almost 14,000 words drafted of this epic thing, but that is not all in order and I do not yet a clear idea of the full ending. I have tagged what I currently know about the plot characters and major pairings, more may be added later.

King's Landing and particularly the White Tower was lonely come nightfall. It was why Brienne had let Tyrion into her chambers the first time, three moons after the beginning of King Bran’s reign. He carried a skin of wine and two cups and had scaled the many stairs to the Lord Commander's -- now Lady Commander's -- rooms. Upon Tyrion’s questions they talked of Jaime, how she had meet him, their time in Riverrun. Tyrion had told her childhood stories of Jaime as a young man. The candles melted to stubs and the wine skin emptied. It was nice to share her time with Tyrion, better to do so with someone she knew also loved Jaime. 

“You know,” Tyrion paused to take a sip of his wine, “I think we might be the only two people in the realm who truly knew who Jaime was.”

Brienne frowned, yet nodded. “Perhaps.”

“Do you miss him?” Tyrion's face scrunched up as he leaned forward. “I miss him.”

Brienne nodded and for a moment the full extent of her sorrow and grief washed over her. “Of course, I miss him.” Her voice cracked, although how much had Jaime ever been hers. 

Tyrion took a long pull on his wine, swallowed. “I sent him to his death.” His words a whisper, and pain evident in them. 

Brienne shook her head. “His guilt sent him to his death.” She remembered cupping Jaime’s face in her hands as the chill of Winterfell blanketed them. “His self-loathing.” She sighed. “He was a good man, but... flawed....” It still hurt so much that her love and the happiness she thought they had shared could not fix Jaime. 

“Broken,” Tyrion said. He gave a light chuckle. “Who would have thought the Golden Lion of Lannister as broken.” 

“He showed few people that side of himself.” She thought to the man she had shared a bath with in Harrenhal, the one who had shared her bed in Winterfell. “It was not until his crippling he could move past being broken.” Yet still, Jaime had fallen short of saving himself, or perhaps she had fallen short in saving him. She sighed and took a deep swallow of her wine, it was good and full bodied. Tyrion always did have the best wine. 

She turned back to Tyrion to find him resting his elbow on his knee, his chin in his stubby hand. “I think Ser Brienne you may have known my brother better than even myself.”

She shook her head. Jaime had been his brother, his best friend. Before Tyrion could speak again a candle sputtered out in a pool of its own wax, and then another. “It has grown late, has it not.” He shoved himself out of his chair. “The morrow will be early and the day long, I best leave you Lady Commander to gather some rest for it.”

Brienne wanted to say that he could stay longer, that tonight, for once in a long time, she had not been so lonely. But, Tyrion gave her a slight bow and left to hobble down all the stairs. 

Since that first night it had become an occasional thing, Tyrion knocking on her door with wine and a shy smile. He would know she was still up from her window light. Even if she did not voice it, she enjoyed the new Hand’s company. 

They talked about Jaime, about King Bran, about how Queen Sansa was doing in the North, about the realm. With his sarcasm and witty remarks Tyrion sometimes reminded her of Jaime, and her heart slowly ached less each time he did so. Sometimes they talked of politics and houses and dealings with the realm. Tyrion was possibly the most learned man she had ever meet, and when his preconceived notions did not get in the way, he was brilliant. 

Other times they spoke of their childhoods. Tyrion's, like her own, had been filled with disappointments and with his disappointing people. Through it all she could tell his adoration for Jaime, the elder brother who had loved and accepted him no matter his statue. Slowly she shared about her family, her father who had always loved her, her brother she had lost, her sisters and mother she did not even remember. 

Sometimes they shared stories of people they both knew: Lady Sansa, Lady Catelyn, the Hound, the Tyrells among others. Sometimes Tyrion told stories about his nephews and niece, particularly of Myrcella and Tommen. Brienne enjoyed those stories, of the children she assumed in his way Jaime had loved. 

“She was with child,” Tyrion said over his shoulder as he crossed to refill his wine goblet one night, more than a year after the burning of King’s Landing. “I'd thought it gave her something to live for, something to be reasonable about.”

“Who?” Brienne cocked her head, although she had already guessed who Tyrion likely talked about. 

“Cersei.” He turned, filled goblet in hand.

“Cersei was with child?” Brienne's words were quiet. A new child, Jaime's child? Part of her felt betrayed and angry that he had not trusted to tell her.

Tyrion's eyes widened. “Do tell me you already knew that?”

She shook her head. “No.” She swallowed, wondered how she would have reacted in Winterfell in that short time she had shared with Jaime had she known.

“It was his.”

“Of course.”

Tyrion took a sip of wine and crawled back up onto his chair. “One could not always assume. Jaime was always devoted to her, but Cersei…. was not as devoted to him.” Jaime had insinuated to Brienne himself that Cersei had had other lovers. Tyrion frowned over at her. “I had always assumed that the babe was part of why he had returned.”

Brienne sighed. “He never told me why he... left Winterfell.” She had assumed it was Cersei at the time. Oh, how that had hurt, that he had chosen his twin and ex-lover over her and a future. Yet, a part of Jaime had never been hers, would never be hers. When she thought back on it now she could see there had often been a distance to Jaime during the time they shared, and a sadness in him. 

Tyrion sighed, frowned again. “Sorry, if I have somehow... I didn't mean you more pain.”

Brienne shook her head. “I knew of his past when I got involved.” Even if perhaps she did not know about this child. They drank in silence for a time and Brienne thought of asking Tyrion to take his leave. 

“Jaime could not have loved two different women in the realm, could he?” Tyrion shook his head, gave a light chuckle. Brienne raised an eyebrow. “You and Cersei. You are such... opposites. She was beauty defined, especially when she was younger, yet rotten throughout. You, however, Ser Brienne...”

She pinched her lips, wondering how he would finish. Compared to Cersei’s radiate beauty Brienne knew herself to be ugly. 

“Are beautiful in an unconventional way,” Tyrion finished. She accepted it, at the least he had not called her ugly, if only because he knew how much such stung. “You’re honorable and righteous, but more… you have a good heart, truly.” He gave a half smile in the smug way he did when he had figured out a mystery. 

“And how would you know?” Brienne tilted her head. 

Tyrion pinched his lips. “I’m a dwarf. Even if people must give me respect because I am the Hand, I can tell those who do in truth. Just the way I can tell those who do the same with King Bran.” 

Brienne shook her head. “Mayhaps I, like you, have a place in my heart for bastards, cripples and broken things?” She used his own words he had spoken to her many times before. 

Tyrion sipped his wine, shook his head. “Mayhaps, yet, I counter that I, knowing my own true heart, know it is not truly good.”

She meant to counter his thoughts, and yet, she did not know Tyrion and his inner desires enough to know her words were truth. 

He waved a hand of dismissal. “Still I find the women my brother did have affections for… unique, and uniquely opposite. And with that, my lady, I should take my leave of you.” He shoved himself off his chair and gave her a low bow before turning to leave her. 

Brienne tried to find sleep afterwards, yet all she could think of was the babe Cersei and Jaime had made and the fact he had not shared such truth with her. 

#

The first winter came and the chill in the air surprisingly did not bother Brienne. She had seen colder, looked into the darkness of winter and lived. King’s Landing had mostly healed, built its burning into a chapter in its story and moved on, the city as hardy as its people. 

“Wildfire and the Mad King.” Tyrion leaned back back in his chair. They had found another catch of wildfire, surprisingly unburned with the city. Tryion, the man who had once lit afire Blackwater Bay, thought Brienne. Not that she liked to think about it, but he had been at the least complacent in Daenerys’ burning of the city. 

“I could find and gather it all,” she said, “if you think his Grace would wish.”

Tyrion waved a hand. “I mean for the city to never face fire again.” They had rebuilt as much of the city with stone as possible. 

“You do know what the Mad King planned with the wildfire?” Brienne asked. Jaime had told her, she remembered it still, warm mist from the baths around him, his pained voice echoing off the tiled walls.

He blinked. “The Mad King used it to burn men alive. He was obsessed with it, so Jaime told me.” Tyrion cocked his head, pinched his lips in reply to Brienne’s neutral face. “Why? What do you know about it?”

She shook her head, and Tryion only leaned closer. “He swore on oath to keep the king’s secrets.”

“Aerys is dead and reviled. Jaime is dead too,” he added. 

She tightened her lips. It was Jaime’s secret, true, yet who else knew about the Mad King’s plans. Tyrion cocked his head, raised his eyebrows, waited impatiently. “Surely he told you why he killed the Mad King?” she finally asked. 

Tyrion frowned and sighed. “There were some things my brother and I never truly talked about. Aerys was one of them. The few times I did ask, he evaded my questions, so I...” Tyrion paused and shrugged, “I left it alone.”

The King’s Hand was a man who collected information, yet he was also Jaime’s brother. Slowly, she began to tell Jaime’s story, about Lord Tywin sacking the city and Jaime warning the king of his father’s likely betrayal, about King Aerys asking for Tywin’s head and Jaime unable to obey. Tyrion gave a sad frown and nod at that, perhaps because he had killed their father opposed to Jaime who could not, even when ordered to do so. Then, she told about the wildfire staged beneath the whole of the city, about the Mad King’s plan to blow it up. They had seen the city half burned and Tyrion had seen the horror of wildfire, they both could imagine the destruction and loss of life had such been lit. 

“He killed the king’s hand and head pyromancer first. Then he killed King Aerys to prevent him from burning King’s Landing. He saved the city.” Brienne finally paused. Perhaps it was better that Jaime had not seen the full destruction, he saved the city once, only to have the Mad King’s daughter and her dragon finish what he had prevented.

Tyrion gave a sad smile. “And no one really cared to ask or know the truth.”

Brienne shook her head. “It was his most heroic act, and he was reviled and hated for it.” She supposed in the end that made him even more a hero, as he had not done it for the glory but because it was the right thing to do no matter what others thought. 

“I miss him,” Tyrion whispered. There were tears in his eyes.

“So do I.” Brienne let her own tears fall instead of wiping them away. It was odd and comforting that she was not embarrassed by such in Tyrion’s presence.

Tyrion took a swallow of his forgotten wine. “Speaking secrets, if I share one, will you keep it in confidence?”

Brienne cocked her head, narrowed her eyes and then nodded. “Of course.” Once lying to keep a secret would have seemed difficult to her. Now she knew why Jaime had been so good at it, so good at telling truths that were full of enough omission to tell little, so good at blank stares. 

Tyrion took another sip of wine. “Ned Stark was not Jon Snow’s father, instead Lyanna was his mother.” So Tyrion told the tale of Lyanna and Raegar marrying and Jon Snow being really Aegon Targeryn. The Starks knew, Sansa had been the one to tell Tyrion, and Maester Samwell, and now herself. 

“All sworn to secrecy.” Tyrion shrugged and sipped his wine. 

Brienne blinked. To have been heir to the throne and instead gone north, left his hidden past behind, still been a bastard. “Jon Snow is a strong man.”

Tyrion nodded. “I like him. I’ve always liked him.” But Tyrion had known the truth and liked his dragon queen better. 

“Unless you have other secrets to divulge tonight, my lady.” Tyrion pushed himself down and out of his chair, then downed the last of his wine. “The wine is gone and we should both likely get some rest.”

Brienne sighed into her own wine. “Yes. Rest would be good.” She did not want to know how late it was. The morning sun and training would come much too early. 

#

As her months of service in the Kingsguard turned to years, Ser Brienne never knew what version of King Bran she might encounter when she greeted him each morn. Oft times it was the young man trapped in a crippled body with a smart mind and too much knowledge. He was fair and just, if a bit moody. Otherwise it was the Three-Eyed Raven, a creature with great powers to see into the past, present and future. He was cold, distant, eerie, and Brienne rather hated the days that King Bran was such. 

Sometimes, the King was more boy than man, scared with wide downcast eyes, seeming limited knowledge of who Brandon Stark today really was. Those days they often said the king was not well and shielded him from duties and an audience outside of his kingsguard, trusted advisors and most loyal attendants. Those days Brienne wondered if Brandon Stark had been the best choice for king. 

This morn Brienne entered the king’s chambers to find the broken boy, wide brown eyes, unkempt hair, a tear streaking down his lean cheek. She at once called upon the king's attendant, what would have normally been a squire although King Bran would never be a knight, and asked to excuse him of all dealings for the day. Together they got him calmed, cleaned and feed, while he mumbled on about breaking the wheel. 

Brienne settled him into his wheeled chair facing the window with an ocean view. She tucked blankets around him for the chill left in the early spring air. Flowers in the courtyard below were just beginning to bloom. Perhaps come summer the king’s health would be such he could make a trip north to visit his sister and Winterfell.

“Break the wheel. Burn them all,” Bran spat the words with such a vengeance it drew Brienne's attention. “Puny humans with their little worthless lives. I made them fucking pay for what they did.”

Brienne stood and took a step away. King Bran looked up at her and his cold dark eyes were something she had not seen before, nor had she ever seen the sneer that hardened his face. “Your grace?” 

“Those who harmed Bran worst were torn and crushed.” A smile lifted his lips into a leer and a chill ran up Brienne's spine. She thought to Cersei’s and Jaime's bodies crushed beneath the Red Keep. 

“Who do you speak of?” She withheld the 'your grace' that always followed her statements. This was not her king she addressed or even Brandon Stark. 

The sneer widened, his eyes darkened. “’The things I do for love.’ That’s what he said when he pushed a boy from a tower window.” 

Brienne blinked. He spoke of Jaime. Her breath caught between the love she still held – would always hold – and the hatred in the dark eyes in the face of Bran. She shook her head. Her voice shook as well as she answered, “He was sorry. He asked for your forgiveness.”

The thing who inhabited Bran’s body gave a bitter, cackling laugh. It only chilled Brienne’s blood further. “ **I** didn’t forgive him.” He shook his head, wide sneer still there. “Kingslayer, oathbreaker, sister fucker. He crippled a child with no regrets.” He pushed against the arms of his wheeled chair to leer closer, his face contorted in anger. The dept of it took Brienne’s breath, made her stumble back another step. 

She shook her head. She wanted to say he had it all wrong, that there was an honorable man in Jaime Lannister, even if the man himself had not thought so. 

“All so easy to manipulate and control, when you have all the knowledge of the ages within you, all the possible outcomes ahead.” There was an evil and knowing glint in his eyes. 

Brienne had often wondered if Bran could have foreseen the future why he had not stopped Daenerys and what she did to King’s Landing. That battle had taken out both the possible queens. Jon Snow, the once King in the North and a secret heir to the throne, having killed Queen Daenrys had been been lucky to get his life back from the Unsullied. Who had it left to rule? Who had then stepped into the role? Brienne’s face must show the shock of it, that the king she had sworn to protect and had believed in as a good and rightful man could have orchestrated the whole thing. 

Just then the door creaked open, and Brienne turned, panic in her eyes, towards it. 

Podrick entered. “Lady Commander? Your Grace? Lord Tyrion had a few things that needed tending, if you think the king is up to it.”

He paused at Brienne’s look. Worry crossed Pod’s features, his hand on the hilt of his sword. 

“Thank you, Ser Poddrick,” came King Bran’s usual mellow voice. “I need just a bit more time to rest first.”

Brienne twirled back to Bran, and there sat the young man who was king, with his usual wise brown eyes and plain almost emotionless features. Pod raised an eyebrow at Brienne, a silent question if everything was alright. She gave him a slight nod in reply, unspoken that it now was. She wondered if she should later tell him of what happened. Surely she did not imagine it. She could not have imagined it.


	2. Ponderings, Observations and an Ally

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Days become moons and moons become years as Brienne observes what the king does and ponders who he might really be and what that might mean to the realm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took a bit. Had to add a missing scene and then took a bit to find time to do a final edit and make the timeline in this work. Next chapter or two might also take a bit as there is some Tyrion & Brienne scheming to still write.

Brienne could not sleep that night and as darkness surrounded the Red Keep she thought of the many words the king had said during her years of service. 

“The Queens were always going to break themselves upon each other.”

‘A Targaryn alone in the world is a terrible thing.’

‘Jon, you do not have my name, yet you have my blood.’

’Chaos is a ladder.’

’The things I do for love.’

‘I will take what is mine with fire and blood.’

‘Sometimes strength is terrible.’

‘Break the wheel.’

‘Burn them all.’

‘You will never walk again, but you will fly.’

‘I have been watching you. All of you. All your lives with a thousand eyes and one.’

She knew most were quotes, words from others the king as the Three-Eyed Raven had heard. She had served King Bran for years now, faithfully, honorably. Age took its toll, it seemed with all but Bran. Gray had crept into Lord Tryion’s curls and beard. Lord Bronn’s hairline continued to recede. Wrinkles now lined the sides of her own eyes and forehead. After a day on her feet in armor her knees and back felt it, and her shoulder ached after a good training session. Yet, Brandon Stark seemed untouched by time. He had been young when he took the throne, yes, yet today he was as baby faced as then. He looked more a lad of ten and six than the two and twenty he truthfully was now. 

The king has asked for weirwoods to be planted in the courtyard garden. The saplings had grown into small trees now, pale bark and a widening spread of red leaves. As those trees grew taller and wider, Brienne felt the king’s presence, that of the young man they had crowned, become less and less. More and more it was the Three-Eyed Raven who greeted her in the morning, stone faced, bland words, dark judging eyes. And this other face she had seen today, the one filled with nothing but hate, how often did he hide behind that stone face? 

Just who had they named as king, a crippled boy or something else, something older and darker and more powerful? Bran had used that power to help destroy the Night King and his army of the dead. He had not done so for King’s Landing, however. “Why do you think I came all this way,” he had said when Tyrion asked to name him king. Bran had known. Had he needed Daenerys and Cersei to fight and destroy the city to make a power vacuum he could take advantage of? The boy had said he did not even want to be the Lord of Winterfell, so they gave him a kingship. Was Warden of the North too small a thing when ruling six kingdoms was within reach?

She thought of the secret of Jon Snow Tyrion had told her. Bran and Maester Tarly had been the ones to discover it. The truth of who Jon Snow was had likely ripped him and Daenerys apart. The dragons warred and Jon killed Daenerys, and then wanted no claim himself to the throne. Had Bran planned all that, had he known how it would end? Much as Brienne liked and respected Jon Snow, he was a predictable man. Snow had been raised a bastard, whatever he might be in truth, he had not wanted to be King in the North, and would not think himself worthy of being King of the Seven Kingdoms. 

Too many thoughts circled her head, what she had seen and heard and knew. Two men more than all others had wronged Brandon Stark the boy. Theon Greyjoy had taken Winterfell from him, had faked killing and burning the younger Stark boys. Theon had protected Bran with his life in the godswood during the Battle of Winterfell, and everyone thought it right and honorable. Had it instead been payment and punishment for his deeds? Had it been blood and death for the wrongs he had bestowed bestowed on House Stark and the boy Bran?

Jaime Lannister had crippled Bran. Perhaps few living knew that truth fully. Lady Catelyn and Robb Stark took it to their graves. Tyrion likely suspected, but did not know the full truth. Brienne had heard Lady Catelyn and Jaime speak of that truth, she had heard Jaime admit it himself to her. She had also been told by Jaime how he apologized, perhaps an unlikely thing for Jaime Lannister, or any Lannister, to do. Yet, the Jaime Lannister who rode north was not the prideful man he’d once been. He had thought it done, forgiven or forgotten, at least weighed against Jaime’s worth. But what worth had a one-handed aged knight been in the Battle of Winterfell? Jaime had fought well, she had seen such herself, however besides helping save herself and Pod, had he made such a difference? 

After Bran had been crowned, the new king had asked her to head his kingsguard. She was the first lady commander, and it had been a chance to restore honor to the kingsguard, a chance to honor Jaime. Her heart was still Jaime’s and always would be. She had seen no husband or family in her future, why not serve her king. Had Jaime’s worth in the Battle of Winterfell been to keep her alive and then go to his death with Cersei so Brienne was free to serve King Bran? 

For the next several moons, Brienne watched the king more closely, paid special attention to his words and his moods. Standing guard it was easy to watch and not be noticed in so doing. The more she watched, the greater her suspensions became. No doubt there was some of Brandon Stark within the king, a sliver of humanity left to him. Yet, even that sometimes seemed an act, a face put on as they all did in King’s Landing to echo having humanity the Three-Eyed Raven did not possess. 

The more she pondered and noticed and concluded, the more her stomach knotted each time she stood behind King Bran, as much a being of power than a young man. At night, when she lay awake and allowed herself to think what it meant for Jaime, it broke her heart. At the least, Bran had allowed for Jaime to return to Cersei and in not preventing the attack on King’s Landing was complacent in Jaime’s death. At worst... Bran in actions or words or manipulation had driven Jaime from the love and warmth of her arms to his death beneath the crumbled Red Keep. The last she could not think in the king’s presence. For more than a decade she had known why Jaime had killed the Mad King, but she had not understood his bravery in looking evil in the face and fighting to act on it. 

The Mad King had been a man, an old, crazy man with Jaime as his sole guard. King Bran was crippled yes, and weak. Yet, he was well guarded and even if she controlled those guards she could not ask them to break their own oaths. Whatever sat the throne though was not a man. It was a being who could see the past, and in theory also the present and the future. 

“‘I have been watching you. All of you. All your lives with a thousand eyes and one.’” Just this morning King Bran had spoken those words, with a twinkle in his eye to her. She had spoken not a word, how could he know what grew in her heart? Did he see a future where she betrayed him? She herself had not decided in truth to even do so yet. 

#

That night when Tyrion visited to talk, Brienne had drunk too much wine and asked. “What all powers do you think King Bran possesses?” 

Tyrion cocked his head, pinched his lips. 

“He can warg into beasts and bird,” Brienne continued. “Can he do so with man? He has seen the past.” Brienne frowned. “Can he see the future? Can he know what we do before we do it?”

Tyrion shook his head and sipped his wine. “I don’t know. He sees visions, bursts of them when he… locks onto the weirwood trees, the connection within the trees.” He sighed. “Perhaps Tarly knows more. He has asked the king more about it.”

“He set into motion actions to save us all from the Night King in Winterfell.” Brienne paused to sip her wine. “Yet, he did not stop the actions in the Battle of King’s Landing.”

Tyrion shrugged. “Even if he saw it, it doesn’t mean he can control anything.” Brienne tightened her lips, because she had her suspicions that Bran could control a great deal more than they thought. “Why,” Tyrion paused to sigh and narrow his eyes on her. “Why do you ask?”

Brienne blinked. Because the thoughts and questions had filled her head for too many moons now and she needed to talk to someone. She almost looked about the room, as if she could see raven eyes within the walls. Did the king listen in, later watch in those bursts of visions what she and Tyrion said in seeming confidence. She finally huffed and shook her head. “It was just a question.”

Tyrion side eyed her, clearly not quite believing such. Yet, he let it past and soon they were talking about the Prince of Dorne and his new wife, about Tyrion’s scheme to forge an alliance between Robyn Aryn of the Vale and one of his Lannister cousins. What did any of it matter if a man who could and likely had controlled them all sat upon the throne? Bran had no heirs and no way to make one, yet what did that matter if he might outlive them all?

#

So the days become moons and the moons years. The Red Keep was full of mindless regularity, meetings and councils and lords and ladies coming and going. Summer bloomed warm and sunny and for a time Brienne let her suspicions alone. What was she to do about it? Overthrow the king she had sworn an oath to protect? King Bran seemed mostly good and just. He had given the realm needed peace to repair and rebuilt itself and in the boundless harvest of summer things looked well for the realm.

Perhaps she would have left it at that, except summer would not remain forever. ‘Winter is Coming,’ the words of House Stark echoed in her head and more and more upon the king’s lips. Hard to remember in the simmering heat of summer in the south. 

Brienne alone guarded the king this morning. The Three-Eyed Raven with his emotionless eyes had welcomed here and even the smile that faked warmth upon his lips did not convince her otherwise. He said that Lord Tyrion and the Small Council could handle themselves, as they did more and more. He said Tyrion could also sit the new throne to hear those who had business with the crown. 

“And what do you plan, your grace?” Brienne asked. She wheeled his chair slow and steady through the wide halls of the Red Keep. 

“The gardens.” His flat voice replied, words she had excepted. It was where the king could usually be found these days, until they carried him away for food and his bed.

“Very well,” came her reply, as empty as his request, less she show her feelings and worry. 

The gardens bloomed with bright flowers. The chirps of songbirds filled it. The warmth of the sun bathed it. Yet, Brienne knew where the king wished her to bring him. The wheeled chair rocked as they made their way to the patch of weirwoods, small things still, Brienne could have wrapped her hands around their pale white trunks, and none stood much taller than a story. Their red leaves provided little shade. Brienne lifted the king from his chair. He was a tall man, yet skin and bones, his legs frail wilted things and his arms not much better. She carried him to beneath the trees and laid him upon the moss at their bases. 

The king blinked his eyes at her, gave her a slight nod of approval. “That will be all.”

Brienne nodded and stepped backwards. The Three-Eyed Raven’s eyes had already gone misty white as he looked upon the world the trees allowed him access to. She turned and took a guarding stance before him, back turned. He would move not until they finally stirred him, made him eat something for the day, returned him exhausted to his chambers. Did he see the future? Was he watching what Tyrion and her had talked of last night? Nothing much more than news of Tyrion’s cousin and castellan Devan and his wife’s new child, another boy. 

The king remained as such when Podrick came to relieve her to attend the Small Council meeting. She expected the usual at the meeting, discussion of boats and men and crops and what coin to use to pay for it. The trivial matters that a king did not really need to bother himself with.

“There is a matter that the king has asked us to see to.” Lord Tyion steepled his hands and placed his chin upon them. 

“Ah, what does the little king want now?” Lord Bronn leaned back in his chair. 

Ser Davos narrowed his eyes, for the king rarely asked things specifically of the Small Council. Tyrion caught Brienne’s gaze before continuing. “King Bran wishes us to have weirwood trees planted in each keep within the realm, starting with the seats of each kingdom.”

“Planting trees?” Bronn sighed and shook his head. “Am I supposed to free up coin for that? Cost us a pretty bit to get him his trees last time.” 

For weirwoods did not readily flower and produce fruit, or at least not that anyone had seen in ages. They had taken grafts of weirwoods farther north, called in every expert gardener at the Citadel and still had to pay for delicate daily care for the first year. Most of the weirwood trees had been cut down south of the neck during the Age of Men. Legend told that they had feared the Children of the Forest used them to spy. Brienne could not help but thinking that skying was exactly what the king meant to use these trees for. 

“All the major keeps already have a godswood,” Ser Davos was saying. “Why would it matter what trees are in it?” Bronn waved a hand at the Onion knight in agreement. 

“True,” Tyrion said, “but the king insists --”

“-- they are weirwoods,” Brienne finished for him. How many decades would it take for the Three-Eyed Raven as king to expand his sight with those trees? He would not ask, if he did not mean for his reign to last that long, or longer.

“When grown they are rather impressive trees,” Grand Maester Samwell said. “And godswoods throughout the realm once contained them.”

“They’re kinda creepy, if’n you ask me.” Davos shrugged. “But,” he added, with a direct look to Bronn, “if the king is asking them of us, we can make sure we grant his request.”

Bronn frowned. 

“Are we in agreement on finding the coin for the trees?” Tryion asked, he made sure to glance again at Brienne who had been silent throughout the discussion. She rather objected but could not verbalize here why. Instead she nodded along with the rest of the Small Council. “Who would like to volunteer to coordinate the endeavor?”

“I will,” Grand Maester Samwell said with a smile and jovial nod. 

“Very well,” Tyrion clapped his hands together. “I think that ends things for today.” He gave a smile and nod. With that they all arose from the table and milled about for a moment before heading off to their other tasks. She should go back and check on the king, yet she knew exactly where he would be still and it would just further spur her worry about what power the Three-Eyed Raven had over them all. 

“Is the king in the gardens, again,” Maester Samwell asked. He had his usual smile, a slight cock to his head, nothing worrisome in his voice. 

Brienne nodded. “Yes. That is where I left him.” 

Grand Maester Samwell had gathered up his scrolls and books, some Lord Tyrion had borrowed as he was want to do. He gestured for Brienne to walk with him. She fell in step beside the rotund maester. She would think badly of his seeming lack of strength, yet he had faced and killed a White Walker, had fought against the dead. Perhaps he was not the best fighter, but he was not a coward. 

“Was there something you wished to talk of?” Brienne asked. 

Samwell nodded and smiled at a passing servant and then motioned her on back to his chambers. Whatever it was he did not wish to talk of it here, in the open. “I forget if you had ever served with my father,” the maester asked, perhaps to pass the time. 

“Lord Tarly?” Brienne nodded. Samwell himself was not Lord Tarly, being instead a man sworn to the Night’s Watch and then to the Citadel, he could hold no titles. “I did,” she answered, “in King Renly’s host. Although I am afraid Lord Randal and I did not… have the best relationship.”

Samwell snorted. Brienne had heard the rumors from years ago, how disappointed Lord Tarly was with his elder son and heir, too book smart, too soft, not at all a fighter. Too womanly would have been Randyll Tarly’s words. “My father was… a hard man to please.” He finished with a pained smile as he pushed open the door to his chambers. 

Brienne wanted to say that whoever Randyll Tarly had been, or whatever he might have done to his elder son by making him take the black, he deserved better than what Queen Daenerys had done. Yet, Samwell knew this and what was the point in wording it. She thought of her own father, growing older at Evenhall, with no true heirs anymore and her not giving him any grandheirs either. 

They entered the Grand Maester’s study. There two boys, Samwell’s sons, were playing. The elder of the lordlings, little Sam, King Bran had made heir to Horn Hill when he came of age, despite him and his brother technically being bastards. Little Sam raised a wooden sword over his head, with his light brown hair and thin face he had gotten only the looks of his mother. Maester Samwell’s younger son, Jon, had his darker hair and rounder cheeks and physic. Jon yelled a battle cry and slashed at his brother with an identical wooden sword. 

“Not in my study.” Samwell frowned as he dumped his books and scrolls on an already almost toddling pile “How many times must I tell you. It’s summer go play in the courtyard, somewhere, anywhere else.” He waved an arm at the door as Brienne stepped aside of it. 

“Yes, father,” came too soft replies. With huffing and a few toppled books, the little lordlings did as asked and left. Samwell shook his head and let out a deep sigh. 

He had not married Gilly his lover to make her officially his wife, not able to given his vows, yet everyone knew about his lover and mother of his children. They had two younger daughters now as well. King Bran wanted Samwell as Grand Maester so everyone kept quiet about such. 

“I meant to speak to you about the king’s health.” The Grand Maester motioned for Brienne to take a seat across from a large wooden desk covered with more scrolls and books. “Sitting about at those trees….” Samwell sighed and frowned. “It will do his health no good. He should already be wasting away.” The Grand Maester shook his head. 

And yet he is not, Brienne thought. What powers of aging and health did the Three-Eyed Raven give to the king? 

“Perhaps you could talk to the king about it,” Samwell was saying. “Get him to move more, to do the exercises that I have assigned him, at the least to get him to eat three good meals each day.”

Brienne frowned. “The king listens to no one about such.” While Brienne was the Lady Commander of his kingsguard and perhaps his favorite guard, she was not in the king’s confidence. “Have you asked Lord Tyrion to speak to him?” 

“Done and ignored.” Samwell sighed and shook his head. “His… crippling leaves him rather susceptible and ignoring his health further….” 

Brienne narrowed her eyes. “And yet, he has rarely been ill.” For such was true, even last winter when it seemed the whole of the Red Keep kept passing along one illness or another, the king had been spared them all. Perhaps it was because he rarely went far from his chambers, yet now Brienne doubted that to be the reason. 

Grand Maester Samwell frowned, furrowed his brows. “Well… perhaps… but, still, it would be best if he kept up his health, or at least tried to do such.”

“I will speak to him.” Brienne nodded, even if she doubted her words would have any affect. “Mayhaps you could suggest something to help keep his attention.” Although, what luck did that have when he had within reach visions of all the past, present and likely future. 

“There was a description somewhere of the Three-Eyed Raven.” Samwell stood up and began to lift open books to peer at their pages. “The one from before the king. It was from the Night’s Watch, or more likely retold from a wilding to the Night’s Watch. Generations old.” Samwell went to looking through the books piled around his desk, a few of the piles having been knocked down by the children. “Here it is.” He gave a bright smile and plopped back in his chair to turn the pages of the book quickly to where he wanted. Brienne did not dislike books, she had always been adequate at her learning as a child, yet she did not see the merit and familiarity with them that men such as the grand maester and Lord Tyrion did. 

Instead of reading aloud, Samwell turned the opened book around and passed it over to her to read. She tightened her lips, yet read as offered. The passage was more than interesting. It told about a creature who may have once been a man, white and wizzled away, grown into a weirwood tree, with eyes as milky white as the bark. King Bran had once spoken to her of a previous Three-Eyed Raven, the one before him, who had given him the powers he possessed, or moved aside for Bran to take them. Like much of what he often said, it did not make full sense to her. 

“Do you think the account is true?” Brienne cocked her head and found herself rereading the page again. 

“Much of the rest in the book matches with other sources.” Samwell shrugged a shoulder. “Things I know to be true about the Night’s Watch. So… it likely does have some merit to it.”

“Do you think… this is what will become of the king?” The question was out of her mouth before she thought if she should voice it. 

“He’s a man.” Samwell shook his head. “He still has to eat, to move, to… he can’t just sit about in those trees all day.”

Brienne agreed, the body of King Bran was human or mostly so. She knew this as part of her tasks involved seeing the care of the humanness of him, his bathing and feeding and such. But, what would he be in another decade or two, in a few more generations? Would the humanity leak out of him until what remained was a husk of a man, physically as linked to the trees as he was now mentally linked to them?

“You can take the book if you want.” Samwell noticed her still reading it. 

Brienne tightened her lips and slammed it shut, meant to give it back to him, and paused. “I will speak to the king, perhaps make up things to keep his attention if I must.” She stood, the large tome tucked under her arm. “Unless there is anything else, Grand Maester.”

“No.” Samwell sighed and shook his head, a slight smile on his lips. “Thank you, Ser Brienne.”

She gave a slight bow of her head as she turned and left. 

#

Silly as she might have thought it, she spent much too much time looking over the book the grand maester had lent her. It was mostly histories of the Night’s Watch as compiled by a previous maester of Castle Black. As she flipped through it she had found a few interesting parts about the Three-Eyed Raven. An all-seeing creature, thought to be mythical, clearly from the tone of the author. The powers listed were much as she thought, sight into past, present and future. Yet there was mention of controlling people by suggestions and perhaps even manipulation of past events. 

The book also mentioned the power of the weirwoods, and of ravens themselves. Myths of the Children of the Forest using the trees to spy, that the eyes in the trees had been carved to allow that. The new weirwoods King Bran grew did not yet have trees carved in them. There was mention of scores of ravens sometimes traveling about, something Brienne remembered Bran sending such in the Battle of Winterfell. Ravens had been more and more common about the Red Keep, and she wondered if it was the king keeping on eye on them all.

But, she was not given tonight to more thoughts and reading. Tyrion entered with wine and a sour look. He raised an eyebrow as Brienne shut the tome and took the offered wine. They chatted for a time about trivial things. She wanted to mention the trees and the king’s obsession with them.

“Do you ever miss sex?” Tyrion said. He leaned back in his chair, took a long sip of wine. 

Brienne blinked, not expecting the question, suddenly taken from her own thoughts. 

“I do not miss marriage in the least, but sex….” Tyrion sighed, frowned. 

Brienne blushed in site of herself and dropped her gaze to the floor between them. 

“Ah, come on. I know you have had sex.” He waved a finger at her. Of course he and everyone knew she and Jaime had done such. “And once you have had sex, especially if it was good sex, it’s hard not to miss it.” He downed half of his wine. 

“Why are we talking about this?” Brienne took a long sip of her wine as well. Although perhaps whatever it was about explained the glum mood he’d arrived in.

“Bronn and a brothel may have played a part.” Tyrion shook his head, sighed, scrunched up his face. “I used to love sex, as much as I love wine. Oh the whores I have had.” He waved his wine glass at her. “And I was good at it.”

“I do not need to hear any details on such.” She scrunched her face in disapproval. She had heard the tales of Tyrion and his whores, but they were now tales. He seemed instead to have throw his attention into repairing and running the realm.

He smirked at her, but did, thankfully, spare her details. “There Bronn and I were, in a brothel, with the best whores in King’s Landings. Young, pretty, with big bouncy tits and firm asses and shapely legs.” He sighed and frowned. “And I just… couldn’t.” 

“Again, why are you telling me this?” She tilted her head. 

“Who else am I going to tell?” Tyrion gave her an exasperated look. 

“If you miss sex, then go have sex,” she stated.

He raised his hands, sloshing wine from his half filled glass. “If only it were that easy. All those pretty girls, and…,” he let out a disappointed sigh and waved at his crotch, “nothing.”

Brienne’s eyes widened and she shook her head. At least she was not thinking about the Three-Eyed Raven, weirwoods and flocks of ravens. Still, sometimes Tyrion reminded her too much of his brother. “So you have moved on from desiring whores,” she managed. “Perhaps you should find a wife. Certainly somewhere there is a highborn lady in the realm sufficient for such.” 

“Sufficient.” Tyrion balked and took a sip of wine. Someday he would have to face that he was Lord Lannister and as such he should marry and have children. Not that she was apt to mention such as Tyrion would only remind her she was the sole heir of Tarth and with her Kingsguard oaths had forsaken marriage and children. She wanted neither and was happy as such. 

She frowned, for she did understand, perhaps not about the whores but about an arranged marriage. 

“Truly, tell me you do not miss it, at least a little.” His sincere face was on. 

“Sex?” Brienne sighed. She could please herself well enough, she had before and she did so now. What she’d had with Jaime had been better, but in truth it was not the sex she missed about him. “Perhaps. More than that I miss… closeness, touching.” Not often in public, but it had surprised her how much Jaime had enjoyed and desired simply touching her, and her touching him. Her life before and since had involved rather little touching of anyone save a few formal situations. 

Tyrion put down his glass and pushed himself out of his chair. He ambled over to her. He had to push himself taller on the arm of her chair and only managed to get his face so close to hers because she slouched from the wine. His lips were there before her, only breath between them. Brienne blinked. He meant to kiss her and risked she would not shove him across the floor. She could feel the ghost of his lips below hers. 

Yes, she had taken vows, but that kept few kingsguard from taking lovers. She knew Podrick did such with women from time to time. The man and love of her life had been dead so many years now. She should move on, she should be able to let another who she knew did care for her into her heart. And yet, her heart was Jaime’s it would always be Jaime’s. She leaned back and placed a gentle hand on Tyrion’s chest. 

“No.” She swallowed as he frowned in rejection. “You have become one of my most valued companions. I enjoy this. You rambling on about politics. You paying care to my opinions on it all.” She sighed and shook her head. “I could not risk what we have. My heart….

“Belongs to another.” Tyrion frowned but leaned away. He shrugged a shoulder. “I would miss this too if I messed it up.”

Brienne gave him a sad smile. She leaned in and gave his cheek a soft kiss. Then, she realized how close they were. Her eyes darted around the room. How well did the Three-Eyed Raven hear whispers? She leaned closer, her hand gentle on the back of Tyrion’s neck with just enough pressure to keep him close. Then, she whispered into his ear, “What if King Bran as the Three-Eyed Raven has manipulated us all?” Her suspicions and ponderings came out as a rush, quick as a moment yet stretching to several minutes.

When she finally sat up and away from him, his mouth opened. Her hand squeezed his shoulder to stop him. She raised one eyebrow slightly. Were her thoughts all madness? Part of grief her for Jaime she did not know she still possessed? Were her thoughts of treason against her king unwarranted. 

“I will ponder it, my lady,” Tyrion said. He stepped away and then cocked his head and looked sideways back to her. His lips pinched and his brow furrowed. What she had said would make him think. How they would discuss any of it further she did not know, but she had told another person. She had an ally.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hopefully that first bit was not too much info dump. The timeline here has a lot of time passing and hopefully that worked okay. I want the Brienne in the later story to be older and perhaps wise and likely more jaded. Also, Brienne I think would rather not act quickly without knowing everything and knowing something must be done. And this is show!Brienne who has not yet been challenged with breaking vows for a greater good. 
> 
> Also, I had originally thought of a Brienne/Tyrion angle to this, but decided against it as Tyrion might be okay with a friends-with-benefits relationship, but that is not really Brienne's way at all. Plus much as Tyrion has grown to mean to her in this, he is still Jaime's brother. Instead, it became her moment of finding an ally.


	3. Schemes and Resolve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With Tyrion now as an ally, he and Brienne move towards what they should do about King Bran, bringing them to a new ally

It was a sennight later when Brienne found herself the last to leave the small council meeting table. “Lady Commander, that matter you inquired about....” Tyrion did not look up from the papers he shuffled. 

Brienne’s brow furrowed, she opened her mouth to ask, and then closed it. Matter? Her suspicions of the king. “Yes,” she answered, her voice casual while her heart pounded. “Did you have time to spare it any further thought, Lord Tyrion?” She lifted his pile of papers while he pushed himself out of his chair. Once he would have balked at the help, but of recent he allowed it, wordlessly. It reminded her a great deal of his brother. 

“Yes.” He peered up at her. “There’s…. merit there.”

So it was not just her imagination. She wanted to ask how they proceeded, what they did next, but how to not give anything away if the king might be watching. She nodded and they started walking. Brienne should say more, she needed to say so much more, yet she had already risked too much with her first confession to Tyrion. 

They walked in silence for a time, down hallways, up and down stairs, on their way to the Hand’s Tower. “Do you trust me?” he asked, not glancing up at her. 

She had trusted him enough to tell him, yes. She knew Tyrion Lannister. He was not his brother, much as he sometimes reminded her of such. Jaime had always been a good man at heart, finally able to climb out of the evil he had done for Cersei or his family or the evil he had been perceived to have done. Instead, there was a darkness that lurked in Tyrion, she had seen hints of it, yet he tried to be a good man and certainly he did want the best for the realm. 

“I do,” she answered. If King Bran really had been manipulating them, really possessed the power they believed, she needed an ally. Who better than the hand? 

They paused at the entrance to the hand’s solar. Tyrion gazed up at her, nodded. “Good. Just be prepared.” He gave her a small smile before taking back the papers. “Thank you for your assistance, Lady Commander.” He gave a slight bow. As she walked back to the training grounds, she wondered if he spoke of the papers or of whatever assistance she had promised against the king. 

Those last words paused her, made her heart race. She had sworn an oath to protect the king and his kin, yet here she was conspiring at least to discover more about him. Did she have the ability to forsake her oaths for the betterment of the realm, much as Jaime had done decades prior? She gazed at the men of the Kingsguard in the yard: parry, thrust, strike. The best that the six kingdoms had to offer, Brienne had made certain of such. 

“Something wrong, ser?” Podrick raised an eyebrow, suddenly at her side. 

Brienne blinked, shook her head. “I was just thinking, Ser Podrick. That is all.” 

He had grown into a handsome and strong man, clean shaven with curled dark hair. The gold of the Kingsguard armor looked good on him, and she knew he wore it with honor. For a moment she wondered if she should tell Pod of her and Tyrion’s possible plans. Then, she pushed the thought aside. She trusted Pod more than any alive, that was true, but she also respected him more than any alive and she would not sully him with what she may end up doing. 

“Training seems to be going well,” Brienne said to end the silence and stop Pod’s inquiring gaze. 

“They’re good men,” Pod said. “The best knights in the realm.” He gave a bit of a smile and nod, to her as it had been her doing in making sure of such. Her doing in making sure King Bran had the best to protect him, and it stilled her thoughts. If she moved against the king, she also would end up fighting those in the kingsguard, her brothers in arms, her friends. 

“Yes.” She nodded and kept the frown she felt from her face. Schooling one’s face was a skill of much use in King’s Landing. 

“Oh,” Pod said, “Lord Tyrion mentioned he was going on a trip to the North. I offered to accompany him, but he said he was going to ask you. Told the Hand you wouldn’t likely like that. Who would you leave in charge?” He gave a light chuckle, his attention on the training. 

Tyrion had asked for her trust. The North, was that Tryion’s idea on where they may be able to talk better? “No, Poddrick,” Brienne found herself saying, “it would be nice to see Sansa again.” She gave a smile when he turned to her. “I am sure you are quite capable of managing for a time if I accompanied Lord Tryion.”

“Really?” Pod’s eyes lit up with pride. 

“Yes.” She smiled and gave a light chuckle. For she meant it, she did trust Podrick to command the kingsguard in her absence. If it came to blows here, it would be Pod who led them, Pod she faced as an enemy. That almost took the smile from her face.

She turned back to watching the men, hoping to hide her feelings. It reminded her of long ago when in a red tent outside the walls of Riverrun she had mentioned and meant the same to Jaime Lannister. Despite her words, she had been uncertain then she could have truly fought Jaime. She felt the same about Podrick. 

#

It was another week before preparations were arranged for their trip north. The king himself was not going because of his health. Brienne wondered if it was because more and more whatever remained of Bran slipped away in place of the Three-Eyed Raven. Wouldn’t Sansa suspect as much as Brienne and Tryion if she saw Bran in person? With the wagons the trip north was a long and dusty one. 

Autumn slowly returned. The Riverlands lay golden with crops that needed harvesting. Odd to see how a years of peace had repaired it, green taking over burnt fields, towns and inns rebuilt. The realm had needed this peace, this time to heal. Would it have gotten the same if someone other than Bran had become king?

“Interesting thoughts, Lady Commander?” Tyrion pulled his horse up beside hers. He usually rode in his wheeled litter but he did not sit a horse badly. His specially built saddle allowed him more security upon the back of his gelding, a gorgeous black mount. He used the reins and voice commands to maneuver him. 

“It looks much different than when I saw this place last, during the wars,” she finally managed. 

“Yes, quite.” He glanced around them. “Queen Sansa I am sure will be happy to see you.”

Brienne nodded. “You are likely to get a warm welcome from her as well, Lord Tyrion.”

He scoffed, but did not disagree with her. Brienne knew a bit of their history. She wondered sometimes why they did not decide to remarry. They were not a bad match. Although, then Sansa would have to come south, or Tyrion give up being Hand to the King, and neither wished to give up the power they held. 

“It is going to be a long month.” Tyrion sighed. “But, my thanks, ser, for joining me on it.” There was a slight twinkle in his eyes, but no words of his plans. 

“It will be nice to see Winterfell again, and especially to visit with Queen Sansa.” They had never been the closest, yet the two women had forged a friendship and a trust between each other. They exchanged rather regular ravens with each other, but Brienne did look forward to catching up in person with Sansa. 

They took the King’s Road through the Riverlands, skirting away from Harrenhal, which Brienne was glad of. It was not a place Brienne wanted to think of. She had thought herself past the pain of Jaime’s death. Perhaps it was seeing the Riverlands again, or Tyrion’s company, or thoughts of Bran and betraying kings, but her feelings for Jaime were closer to the surface than they had been for years. 

Most nights she joined Tyrion for dinner in his tent. Not Lannister red with lions as his brother’s had been, but black with the gold raven sigil King Bran had taken as his own. They would talk until the camp quieted for the night, but never about the one thing Brienne most wanted to talk about, what they would do about the Three-eyed Raven king. But such was not safe, for she had seen more ravens about during their trip north than ever before. She always made sure to not look at them, to try to make it look as if she did not truly notice them, as if she did not know the king even here kept watch over them. 

They had reached the neck when a messenger came in the evening, escorted to the hand’s tent by one of the Lannister guards Tyrion had brought with him. The messenger was a short man, dressed in plain greens and brown. He swept back his dirty brown traveling cloak to reveal a small circled lizard on his breast, the only evidence of a sigil Brienne could see. 

“Leave us, please.” Tyrion waved his arm to dismiss his man. He placed his wine down and leaned forward in his chair. 

The messenger stepped forward, his gaze for a moment on Brienne. She wore her usual armor of the kingsguard, golden with the king’s sigil in the center of its breast. 

“She can be trusted,” Tyrion said. He motioned the messenger closer. “Word?”

“A note, not to be trusted with the ravens.” The man handed it off to Tyrion. While the hand seemed to know who this man was, or at least who he represented, he did not voice so to Brienne. She cocked an eyebrow and waited for Tyrion to read the note and possibly give her any sort of explanation. 

Tyrion nodded. “Ser Brienne can help me with this.” He put the edge of the note into the flames of a candle on the table and placed the burning paper into an empty dish. 

The messenger again gave Brienne a look, then Tyrion a bow, before he swept his cloak back over himself and left. She raised an eyebrow to Tyrion. He glanced about the tent, empty save them, and yet they both knew unseeing white eyes could see their actions. 

He pushed himself off his chair and walked around the table, grabbing a jug of wine as he did so. He topped off her wine glass, leaning close in the action. Brienne looked at the glass and leaned closer still to Tyrion. 

“An ally,” he whispered to her ear. “One I had heard of and from recently. We are not the only ones with suspensions about the king. Just follow my lead on the morrow.”

She made no expression, even if she was exasperated at how Tryion kept her from his plans. She sipped the wine and gave him her thanks as he returned to his seat. 

Tyrion had settled back into eating dinner, and they talked a spell about what houses were left upon the King’s Road in the north for them to pay the king’s respects to. “I was thinking I might ride along with you tomorrow,” he said. “Get some fresh air.”

Brienne nodded. “That would be nice, my lord. I imagine the air within your litter gets stuffy after a time.” In reality the air had been chill of late. Tyrion would be much warmer in his litter than out in the cold on a horse, but she not voice such. 

#

The next day they continued on through the neck. Brienne rather hated it, a sliver of road bordered by swamp as far as could be seen in any direction. No horse would last long in the muck and still black water. Even with a chill, the air hung as thick as the moss from the tree branches. 

“There are some interesting tales of the crannogmen,” Tyrion commented. 

Brienne huffed, her eyes surveying the surrounding bleak landscape. Whether she wished to hear them or not, Tyrion then proceeded to share. There were times he rather reminded her of Jaime, times that it made her miss a man years dead and gone. 

Her eyes caught something off in the distance, movement, perhaps just another snake or worst one of those large lizards. She had seen too many of both so far on their travel through the neck. But, no, this was wooden, low in the water, the shadow of a man on a boat. She sat higher in her saddle for a better look. 

“Something wrong, my lady?” Tyrion cocked an eyebrow. 

The water was still and surely a boat would have made a wake of some kind, although who knows in the odd shallow water of the swamp. Then whatever she had possibly seen was gone again. “No.” She shook her head. “I thought…. I seem mistaken.” Tyrion continued to cock his eyebrow, but just went on with his current tale, something or other about the Marsh Kings. 

They made camp in a wider area of the road, the ground off the road usually too soft to walk much less stake tents or hobble the horses in. The sooner they were in the rest of the north the better. When Brienne dismounted she meant to hurry on to checking on how well camp was being made. A tug on her sleeve from Tyrion paused her. 

“Do you think you could escort me to my tent, Lady Commander?” He peered up at her with a twinkle in his eyes. 

“Certainly,” she replied, though she struggled to keep the frown from her face. 

She thought they would walk towards the bulk of the camp in the middle of the road. The air grew chiller as evening fell. Instead, Tyrion headed for the farther parts of the camp, almost into the nearby swamp. Here a collection of trees had made a crannog as those in the neck called them, a built up bulk of land above the swamp itself. Still the ground squished under her boots. 

Tyrion walked closer to the swamp, until the ground gave under Brienne’s weight and made squelching sounds each time she lifted her feet. A day past they had seen a horse step too far into such mud and though they saved the rider, the swamp took the horse. 

“Lord Tyrion.” She reached out to his shoulder. She was about to tell him to be careful, less he step too far and get stuck, when the messenger from the other night materialized before them. Brienne would say he came from the mist thickening in the chill air, but men did not in reality do such. He had been hiding, waiting. 

The messenger said nothing, just motioned them forward, to where he waited in a low wooden boat. Brienne blinked, for it was the boat she had seen earlier. Again, she reached out a hand to Tyrion’s shoulder. She was a knight of the kingsguard and fighting men with swords upon solid ground she knew well. This, this place and these people, she did not know, did not trust she could keep herself or Tyrion safe. 

“We can trust them,” he whispered up at her. He gave a slight smile at whatever look of worry she cast down at him. Finally, Brienne nodded and joined Tyrion and the messenger in the low boat. 

The boat was long, yet barely big enough for all of three of them. Their guide sat in back. Instead of oars he used a long paddled rudder to push the boat through the narrow water passages through fallen logs and trees draped with moss, fallen. She doubted the water was deep, yet knew below was more of the wet sinking mud. As night grew so did the mist enveloping them

“Where are we going?” she finally asked. 

“Somewhere that should be safe, for a time,” the messenger said, not taking his eyes from the still water and growing mist. 

“We’re going to meet someone who may be able to help us,” Tyrion said. His voice crackled a bit, perhaps with fear. Brienne found her eyes looking above them, clouds covered the night sky. Where were the ravens, where was the watchful eyes of their king?

Eventually they came to a crannog with a roughly built hovel upon it. Their guide pulled the boat close enough for them to exit. Brienne had to give Tyrion a boast to help him out of the low boat, then the guide was off again into the mist. 

“Your distraction worked, Lord Tyrion,” a voice said as a young woman materialized from beside the hovel. She wore brown pants and a green tunic allowing her better to blend with the swamp around them. Her left hand comfortably held a bow and the belt at her waist a long knife.

“Good.” Tyrion peered up at Brienne. “Sorry, I had to keep you in the dark, my lady,” he said. “Words... are dangerous to share.”

She pinched her lips but knew he spoke the truth. “What did you send the king off to do?” 

“Rumors of the spread of the Stone Men out of Valyria, led by the Shrouded Lord.” Tyrion raised his eyebrows. 

“Is that true?” Brienne cocked her head. Not that what happened in Valyria would affect them much, but the spread of greyscale to Westeros would not be a good event. 

Tryion shrugged his shoulder as they made their way up the crannog to the hovel. “Perhaps. Either way, it has drawn the king’s interest for a time.”

“Which is all we should need,” the woman who had greeted them said. 

The ground beneath Brienne’s boots sank and squished too much. The woman entered the hovel, nothing more than walls of lashed wood and a roof of thatch. Within was a central fire, which the woman stoked. The smoke rose through a hole in the center of the roof. 

“I’m Meera Reed,” the woman finally introduced herself. 

“Only child of Howland Reed,” Tyrion stated. “Lord of the Neck.”

“Who fought with Lord Eddard Stark in the south, and is loyal to House Stark,” Meera finished. She was slim and almost as tall as a man. Her dark curls were cut short enough to only reach her shoulders. Her dark eyes held warmth. “My younger brother Jojen, I and a giant of a man named Hodor traveled with Bran Stark north of the Wall. I alone traveled back south to Castle Black and Winterfell with him.”

“So you know the king?” Tyrion tilted his head. He wandered around the hovel, though it held little but roughly made furniture.

“I knew Brandon Stark,” Meera answered. 

Brienne raised an eyebrow. “He is no longer Brandon Stark.”

Meera tightened her lips and nodded. “The part of him that was Brandon Stark died north of the Wall.”

Tyrion climbed into a chair beside the fire and crossed his arms. “If he’s not Brandon Stark, then what is he?”

“The Three-Eyed Raven.” Meera sat down across from Tyrion. 

“What is the Three-Eyed Raven?” Brienne remained standing. She found her hand clenching the hilt of Oathkeeper. The ruby and lion cold and comforting upon her palm. 

Meera frowned, sighed. “The things I have seen Bran do, wonderful, and amazing, and… horrible.” The words spilled out of her. She told about Jojen’s greenseer visions and swearing themselves to Bran. She told about how Bran could warg into his direwolf Summer, about how he warged into their simple-minded traveling companion Hodor more than once to aid them. She told about the cold of the north, her brother’s ill health and eventual death by the Army of the Dead. She told of the Children of the Forest, small manlike creatures who were old and wise. She told about meeting the old Three-Eyed Raven, giving an image just like the book account Brienne had once read. He had been ageless, powerful, knowledgeable. 

Meera told them about Hodor, and what Bran had shared of his fate. The man who had been child Bran’s legs, a simpleton everyone thought. Bran had been trapped in a vision with a younger Hodor in the past when the White Walkers and their army attacked the Children of the Forest. He had used that connection to Hodor in the past to make Hodor of the present hold the door closed against the Army of the Dead to save her and Bran. 

“’Hold the door,’ he had shouted.” She frowned. “He created Hodor. Whatever he did in that vision ruined the boy Hodor had been before. Even if Bran had not intended it.” Her frown deepened. “And he seemed not to care, not to get how horrible that was. I vowed myself to him. My brother sacrificed himself for Bran. I got him safely back to Winterfell, only to have him dismiss me, like I was nothing, no one.”

Brienne heard the bitterness in Meera’s voice, noticed the longing in her eyes and sad frown upon her face. Had Meera as a girl alone with Bran been in love with him? It would not seem odd for her to have at the least had feelings for him. 

“Why are you telling us this?” Brienne lifted her chin. 

“You made him king.” Meera sighed, cross her arms across her chest. “I know that whatever the Three-Eyed Raven is should not be a bad thing. The Children of the Forest protected him. Would they have done that if he had been a creature of evil? And so far as king he has helped the realm. He allowed the North independence. I can’t see faults in any of what he has done, but….”

“It still worries you.” Tyrion tightened his lips, cocked his head, narrowed his eyes in thought. “Why?”

Meera shook her head and let out a shaky breath. “The Three-Eyed Raven we meet in that cave far beyond the Wall had been hidden for ages, and he seemed content with such. He watched and he saw, but he did not act. He claimed he called to Bran to replace him as he was growing too old. But, Bran was, still is, too linked to the living, he couldn’t just hide away.”

“He helped us defeat the Night King and the Army of the Dead,” Brienne said. Both had been part of why she had trusted King Bran, both to name him king and to serve him. 

Meera gave a small smirk and snort. “Was that really such a good thing?”

“Surely the dead sweeping over the realm would have been the end of us all.” Brienne tightened her lips and her grip on Oathkeeper.

“Did the Night King want the living or the Three-Eyed Raven?” Meera titled her head up at Brienne. “Did anyone care to ask?”

Tyrion steepled his hands and rested his chin upon it. “Bran did say that the histories he held was the thing the Night King wanted to destroy most of all.” 

“And so you helped the Three-Eyed Raven destroy his long time enemy.” Meera frowned. 

“Surely you did not mean us to sit aside and not fight the dead?” Brienne stepped forward. 

Meera reached for the knife at her waist. Tyrion reached out his arm to pause Brienne. “That has all been done. Nothing for it now.” He looked up at Brienne. “You have seen how more and more he cares about nothing but his visions. I run the realm more than him these days.” Brienne frowned, for it was true, much of the good done by the ‘king’ in the last year had really been done by Tyrion himself. 

“You know he uses the ravens to see, sky,” Tyrion continued. “You know he has plans to return weirwoods to the south and he likely means to use those for the same purpose. He has not aged. He never gets ill.”

“He is no longer human, but something different, something more.” Meera finished. 

Brienne tightened her lips. They both spoke the truth. She had known this for a long while. She thought back to the hatred she had seen in the king’s face as he spoke about Jaime, about the man that she loved who had possibly died because of Bran’s actions. She gave a single nod. 

“Now that we have given him such powers,” she spoke, her voice more steady than she felt, “how do we take it away?”

“The Children,” Meera said. 

“You said they perished in the north.” Tyrion cocked his head. 

Meera shook her head. “Most, but not all. My father, long ago, in the false spring visited the Isle of Faces. He has rarely spoken of it, but when he does…. There were Children of the Forest there, and I think, I hope, that is still the case.”

Tyrion leaned forward in his chair, placed his hands on his knees. “And how can they help us?”

Meera shrugged. “Of that I am not completely certain. But the Three-Eyed Raven is a magical being and we need another to fight him. Who else do we have?” For the Night King was gone and what magic might have existed with Daenerys and her dragons had been killed or fled to Essos. 

“Why would they help us?” Tyrion cocked his head. Brienne stepped closer to stand right behind his chair. 

Meera looked at them, her face set, her lips pressed into a tight frown. She looked posed to strike, a warrior. Brienne realized that although she had just meet the young woman she trusted her, perhaps because they needed her, perhaps because her story had been honest. This woman had once had feelings for Bran and the fact she was convinced standing against him was the right choice steadied Brienne’s own resolve. 

“Because,” Meera answered, “I believe, hope, they want order in the world.” 

“And the power the Three-Eyed Raven has been given has undone that order.” Tyrion nodded. 

“Over time, which is such a short thing for the Children, yes, it will undo the order.” Meera nodded as well. 

“We have nothing to lose by asking for their help.” Brienne nodded. 

“I mean to travel there, to the Isle of Faces.” Meera said. 

“I’ll send you word when we have given Bran another distraction,” Tyrion said. Meera nodded. 

“Why do you ask for our help?” Brienne asked. Meera Reed was a capable woman, a warrior if not in armor and armed with a sword. 

Meera looked up at Brienne. “What I know is the Neck, and the North. I know little about the politics of the South, of queens and battles and wars.” She looked between them. 

“We do,” Brienne said. 

“A bit, at the least,” Tyrion finished. 

Meera nodded. “Besides, the more people we have to counter him, the more likely one of us might succeed. I will send word for you to join me when I know more. Roin will be waiting for you at the boat.” 

And that was it, Brienne perceived. Tyrion gave a slight bow and Brienne a gentle nod of her head. Darkness had fallen as the transversed the still, black waters. Frogs croaked and cicadas buzzed louder than the thoughts in Brienne’s head. She had known this needed to be done, had known, and yet faced with the fact that they were conspiring against her king, even if she believed such to be the right choice, saddened her. Perhaps she had expected one singular moment where she knew she must choose, as Jaime had recounted when he killed the Mad King.

Sitting before her in the boat, Tyrion seemed as lost in his thoughts. Tomorrow they traveled north towards Winterfell. The time spent with Sansa would be a good reprieve from all the worries that had consumed her of late.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tyrion kinda took the led on this part. Sorry. Brienne will hopefully be more the one in charge in the next chapter. Also much background from the books here, which will continue in the next chapter. The draft as of right now, Chapter 5 is when we finally get Jaime back.


	4. To Proceed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Having decided to move against King Bran, Tyrion and Brienne work with allies to do just that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note, Jaime has died in this. Some graphic mention on such in dreamform in this chapter.

Winterfell was relaxing, at least in part. Brienne had forgotten how direct the Northern lords tended to be. They wore their issues on their chests and were not shy to mention them. After all the politics in King’s Landing it was refreshing, if a bit jarring. 

Seeing Sansa again was pleasant, even if in truth she had little to share with the Queen of the North she had not already done so by raven. Things in the North were going well and Sansa spent much of her time explaining it all, in more details that Brienne really wished to hear. The queen also asked more than once about Bran. It seemed the king was not nearly as regular with ravens to his sister than Brienne. She told Sansa the facts, how Bran spent much of his days, yet she paused and did not say more. How did she explain that the Bran who had been Sansa’s brother withered away somewhere inside the Three-Eyed Raven?

Tyrion and Sansa got along rather well, and even flirted with each other. The few smiles upon Sansa’s lips were from japes Tyrion said. Perhaps if things had played out differently they would have found happiness together. Given how much they both liked, and generally yielded power well, they would have been a force in such a world. 

As for Brienne herself, thoughts of Jaime were too close to the surface and being back in Winterfell did not help such. She would turn a corner and remember a moment with him there. It had only been a moon with him as hers, she told herself, so many years ago now, yet her heart seemed not to care. The nights were the worst, the chill air with no one to warm her, the smell of the fur blankets taking her back to when Jaime’s arms would wrap around her. 

No wonder then that she dreamed of Jaime. It had started with love making. Brienne ran her nails down his warm, sweaty flesh. She breathed in a scent that was completely Jaime, musk and leather and oil from tending swords. She felt an ache between her legs that had been missed. 

Then, the scene shifted and Jaime was running away from her, first with bare skin and then in his plain leather jacket and pants. She chased after him as she should have that night he’d left Winterfell. Whenever she almost overtook him, he looked over his shoulder, a deep sadness in his eyes. It broke her heart, that she could not help him, could not save him. 

Finally, she caught him, her hand grabbing his arm as it had in the dragon pit at King’s Landing. He turned to her with as much awe as then, eyes wide, mouth slightly parted. Again, they were both bare. Blood dripped from wounds when Jaime fully faced her, it coated his hair in dark red mats. 

“No,” she mouthed, but could not voice. She caught him as he fell, as she had in the baths of Harrenhall. Somewhere a raven cawed and flapped its wings. 

Jaime’s eyes caught sight of her and softened, a small, sad smile graced his lips, as blood dribbled from them. It was then she noticed his chest, a brand rested above his heart, the three-eyed raven sigil of King Bran. More caws sounded, and when Brienne looked up she knelt holding Jaime in a swarm of ravens. Their black flapping wings blocked out the sun and their yellow eyes punctured the darkness, always watching, waiting, seeing. A chill ran up her spine. 

“Brienne,” Jaime's hoarse whisper of her name drew her attention back to him. His skin was damp and chilled, yet his eyes were lucid and clear, staring at nothing but her. “It’s yours. It will always be yours,” he repeated the words he had upon returning Oathkeeper to her. Yet, she was without her sword. Then, he gave another small, sad smile, and took a last ragged breath. 

Brienne awoke with a scream. She bolted upright. Her heart raced and her empty arms wrapped around herself. She had not seen Jaime’s body, wanting instead to remember him as he had last been, alive, misguided, a better man than he thought. Tyrion had mentioned he’d found Jaime in Cersei’s arms, both dead, before she had stopped him from ever telling her more. 

She remembered sometime or another Tyrion had been on about dreams and forseeing through them. The greensight, Meera Reed had called it. Not that Brienne had a bit of such magic in herself. Besides, it could not be a foretelling, Jaime was dead, even if at this moment with the fresh memory of his warmth upon her skin it seemed hard to believe. 

Morning found her in the yards. She battered her way through many of the guards of Winterfell and then those that had traveled north with them. None of it made her feel any better.

After having broken his fast in the Great Hall, Tyrion found her resting upon a bench beside the training yard. She must look a sight, her hair wet and matted with sweat, her cheeks red from exertion and the chill morning air. 

He paused beside her. “You’ve cut your face, my lady.” Tyrion gestured to her cheek.

Brienne scowled down at him. “It’s nothing.” They had used blunted blades, still she had cuts and bruises, she had given more, including a few broken bones, this morning.

He sighed, pinched his lips and climbed up to sit beside her. “Is there a reason you have spent the morning fighting any and all who would dare face you?” For she had sparred occasionally on their travels, but nothing like in the last few hours. 

“I had a dream,” she whispered, her eyes on the ground at her feet, not Tyrion’s green eyes. 

“A dream? Pray tell about what?” 

Brienne swallowed. She thought about Jaime’s body bare and bleeding in her arms, about the host of ravens surrounding them, about the mark upon his chest, about how her king had possibly been the one to take the love of her life from her. She shook her head. 

“Or who?” Tyrion asked, a whisper. 

She glanced to see him peering up at her, head cocked. She had only sparred with Jaime a few times, after the Battle of Winterfell, before he left. When she thought of swordfighting and Jaime, she instead remembered how well he had fought with his hands in chains after a year of wasting away in the Stark camp, she thought about them fighting side by side during the Battle of Winterfell. She was certain she would never fight beside anyone, even Podrick, and it feel so natural and easy. 

Tyrion still waited, worry starting to crease his brow. “Jaime,” she finally answered, less he believe it was the Three-Eyed Raven she had dreamed about. 

He frowned. “Sorry, Brienne. I… had not thought how this place might… bring back memories for you.” 

“Most are not bad memories.” She sighed. “Still… he is dead, gone.” Forever, she left unspoken. Part of her knew this ache still in her chest at even a mention of Jaime would never go away, the emptiness he had left was here to stay. 

Tyrion blinked, nodded, frowned and looked away. “Yes,” he finally said, “he is.” 

It was not something either of them could change. Not something to dwell upon. She pushed herself up from the bench, already feeling the ache of sore muscles and bruises. “It was just a dream.” If Tyrion had any other thoughts about it, he thankfully kept them silent.

#

The rest of their time in Winterfell and the North was thankfully busy. They traveled to Castle Black to visit with Lord Commander Jon Snow. Brienne watched him closer than she had in awhile. He was Rhaegar’s son, Tyrion had said, she had not known Rhaegar so had no way of seeing or knowing such. He looked like the same Jon Snow, a harsh expression and brooding mood, yet the Night’s Watch had restored itself to something upon his watch. It was Tyrion who asked the question what exactly it was the Night’s Watch protected them from if not the Night King or Wildings. 

“Even if we defeated the Night King, there is no telling if other White Walkers will not return,” Lord Commander Snow answered, his face serious. 

“Perhaps.” Tyrion pinched together his lips, narrowed his eyes, he did not seem as convinced of such. When he asked if the Night’s Watch or wildings had seen any evidence of such, Snow shrugged, sighed.

A raven alit on the open window to the Lord Commander’s chambers. It cocked its head, peered at them with beady yellow eyes. The ravens it seemed had followed them to the Wall. Brienne placed armor on each morning with the sigil of a raven and more and more it caused a pit in the depths of her stomach to do so. 

Jon Snow eyed the raven back. “You know Lord Commander Mormont had a pet raven. It would talk, nonsense most of the time, except when oddly not.”

Tyrion nodded. “I remember. An odd pet.” Of course the Mormonts were no more, the last of them dead in the Battle of Winterfell. If the king’s hand felt any eeriness from this or the other ravens, he did not let on. 

“We’ve been excavating East Watch, slowly,” Snow said. “What builders we have left are uncertain that the wall there could be properly rebuilt. Maybe next time I am south I should talk to Bran about such.” He furrowed his brow. Jon Snow had not been south of Winterfell since coming north and no one in the room really expected him and his half brother – or was it truly cousin? – to ever meet in person again. 

Tyrion leaned back and rested his chin on his hand. “Find anything interesting?”

“Dead mainly. All have been burned, the few brothers of the Night’s Watch and those from the Army of the Dead.” For the Night’s Watch still burned the dead, as they still believed the horrors of winter were real and would return. Brienne still remembered the dead after the Battle of Winterfell. Seeing the dead that fought valiantly had been hard, worst had been the rotting flesh and bones of the Army of the Dead, rendered lifeless and crumbled throughout the keep. 

“They’ve also found,” Snow continued, paused, furrowed his brow further, “a few of the dead... with blue eyes.”

Tyrion pushed himself forward, cocked his head. “Blue?”

Brienne tilted up her chin. “Wrights when destroyed lose their blue eyes, do they not?” She remembered them turning to the milky white of death, staring, perhaps finally at peace. 

Snow nodded. “Yes. Or if the control over the bodies ends.”

The raven at the window cocked its head to the other side, took a few steps closer to the Lord Commander. Brienne made certain to not turn to it, for the Three-Eyed Raven listened in. She shoved down the smile she wanted to give, for the king heard as well as she and Tyrion that perhaps some of his enemy remained in the frozen north. 

The Lord Commander shrugged, pushed himself out of his chair. “Likely it means nothing.” He crossed and stoked the fire. “We’re rebuilding the Night’s Watch, training more rangers and keeping note of anything the wildlings see.”

“Winter is coming again,” Brienne said. Not that anything in the north should again stir as it had before. Legend said it took generations to see such an event, and if the king had truly destroyed his enemy of the Night King such would never happen again. 

“Yes, winter is always coming.” Jon Snow sighed and turned to them, his face as dour as his black garb. Lines had started around his eyes, whether or not he was an old man, he had lived the life of one already. 

Tyrion crossed to the fire himself and reached out his hands to warm them. “They say the words of house Stark are always eventually true.” He gazed up at Lord Snow, who nodded in reply. 

When they left the Lord Commander, Brienne nodded at Tyrion and traveled to the area that housed the force they had brought with them. She had already picked out the man to be her messenger, one of the Lannister troops, a young thin man, the third son of a minor house in the Westerlands. He was loyal and followed directions perfectly. He thought nothing of taking a note back to the neck, of changing out of his Lannister livery or leaving in the dead of night. As he had been told, he would not look at the note Brienne had given him. 

Overhead a few ravens fought the cold winds up and over the Wall to the north, away to search for the remains of the Three-Eyed Raven’s enemy. Not one seemed to notice the lone, plainly clad rider going south to give word to Meera Reed now was her time to slip south unnoticed. 

#

Upon her return to King's Landing Brienne felt oddly at peace, more so than she had in years. Had it been truly years since she had begun questioning King Bran? How they would counter the Three-Eyed Raven, Brienne knew not, but she had faith that Meera Reed would find something to aid them, some way to proceed. More importantly, she had finally resolved to act against the king. That decision alone lifted a weight she did not know she had been carrying. 

After delivering a message to Maester Tarly one day, she found them alone in his study. Perhaps she should leave well enough alone, yet she could not resist asking, “What do you know of the Children of the Forest?” 

Samwell looked up at her, blinking. “The mythical beings that the northerns have tales of?”

“Yes. I heard some tales of them in the North.” Brienne cocked her head, a true statement as she had heard talk to them amongst brothers of the Night's Watch. “Are they really mythical?”

“Well...” Samwell shrugged. “So many things once thought mythical have been seen in the last years, so who knows really. Legends might be a better word.” He nodded to himself in agreement of such. 

“And what do the legends say?” Brienne asked. 

“They were short, lived long lives, didn’t like the First Men much.” Maester Tarly frowned and waved a hand. “Well, obviously there was more than that to it all.”

“Were they magical?” Brienne realized she was holding her breath. Could the Children of the Forest, if they even still existed, be their savior?

“You mean magical like dragons and White Walkers and warging.” Sam shrugged again. “I suppose… They worshiped nature, like the weirwood trees. While they are always described as manlike, they wove plants into their hair, wore bark leggings and cloaks of leaves, almost as if they were more of nature than man. King Bran has said that the Children created the White Walkers, to fight the First Men. There certainly is similarity to the magic mentioned by the Children, greensight and such, and the ones some northerners and wildings seem to have. Makes you wonder if perhaps there was intermarriage or some such and it was passed down.”

“What magic do they mention?” She took a seat across from him, his pile of books and scrolls between them.

“Greensight, controlling animals, even talking with the dead,” the Grand Maester answered. It all reminded Brienne of what the Three-Eyed Raven could do, although his abilities seemed stronger. Sam tapped a map spread out on his desk. “Of course there is also the legends about them flooding the neck to stop the Andals, and using the hammer of waters to shatter Dorne. So their powers must be greater, perhaps in combination, or if their magic affects nature.” He shook his head. “Mind, this is all legend. Yes, the king claims he has seen Children of the Forest, but...” But, sometimes the king is not certain what was past and present, Sam Tarly was not willing to take the king at his word for proof. 

“Did they make the Three-Eyed Raven?” Brienne asked. For she too had heard the stories that they had made the Night King. 

Samwell shrugged. “I have no idea. It's a greenseer, although there seems more to it than that. And... again if you believe what King Bran says, it appears the powers or the right or... well something, is passed from one person to another. Perhaps there was a Three-Eyed Raven who was a Child of the Forest, who knows how long ago. It is all an interesting subject though, even if hard to tell truth.” He huffed perhaps an aside to himself about the difficulty. 

Brienne nodded. “Yes, it appears so.” Meera Reed had been adamant about having lived among the Children of the Forest for a time, and unlike Brandon Stark, she was a trustworthy witness. Clearly, Grand Maester Tarly did not know about her, which did not surprise Brienne in the least. King Bran would not have liked Sam to go questioning Meera Reed and giving the Grand Maester doubts. 

“I have likely wasted enough of your time with legends and stories of old.” Brienne rose and gave a slight bow of her head. 

Sam waved a hand and shook his head. “No, always nice to tell stories, to inform someone of things.” He gave a smile. “Anytime, Lady Commander.”

Brienne nodded again. The Three-Eyed Raven was using Sam, his knowledge and care of his ailing physical body. That pained her, as Samwell Tarly was perhaps one of the most kindhearted people she had meet. “Thank you,” she spoke as she exited. 

None of what Grand Maester Tarly had told her spoke of how the Children of the Forest could and even would aid them. Instead of worrying on it, Brienne threw herself into her duties, as if she was not plotting to overthrow the king when the moment came. And the moment did come, sooner than she might have thought. A messenger in the night, this one a common man in simple green clad clothing. He passed her a note in the armory one day, not speaking a word to her. 

Upon the green seal was the lizard of House Reed. Inside were instructions on how to come to Meera. She burned it in a fire around the training yard used for heat in the chilly early winter air. On the morrow she mentioned to the council, Lord Tyrion included, about a trip to Harrenhal. A survey of the ruined keep and assessment of what to do with it had been one of the many things King Bran had wanted for years. What better way to get so close to Gods Eye Lake and the Isle of Faces? Tyrion did not flinch or raise an eyebrow, but said he thought his accompanying Brienne might be useful, as she knew little about architecture, a truth and an excuse. 

#

Seeing Harrenhal again had only been eased by the fact it was a gateway again to a new direction. It was easy enough to leave their small company upon the second night, all loyal to her or Tyrion, and slip away to the boat she knew would be hidden among the reeds. 

The mist only thickened as they slowly rowed further into Gods Eye Lake. Tyrion sat in the bow of the boat and cast a worried look to her over his shoulder. Brienne kept her hardened face and continued to row forward. The chill winter air fogged her breath and lessened the sweat that dripped down her back under her thick blue jacket. She could not wear the golden armor of the Kingsguard to betray the king. 

“Into the unknown.” Tyrion frowned. The mist muffled even his words. 

“So it would seem.”

The mist grew thicker. Brienne could barely see even Tyrion in the bow now. The air hung heavy around them. The soft sound of the oars and her steady breathing the only sounds in her ears. She caught another worried look from Tyrion, but he said nothing more. 

She knew her way around a boat and how to row straight, hopefully such was enough, she had heard that the Isle of Faces hid within the lake. In truth, she disliked magic, yet it would be their greatest weapon against the Three-Eyed Raven. 

They continued through the oppressive fog upon the silence of the lake for what seemed eternity, and yet may have been only a mere hour. They did not see the shoreline before they felt it. A bump and the scraping of the bottom of the boat against reeds. 

Tyrion gripped the sides of the bow. “The isle?”

Brienne sat higher and rowed again, her oar hitting something solid. “Yes,” she answered. She stepped from the boat with ease and drug it onto a muddy shore thick with reeds. Tyrion climbed awkwardly from the boat and aided some in pulling the boat fully from the water and placing the oars away within it. 

When they turned from their task two figures stood further up a narrow meadow. The taller was hooded in a roughspun dark green hooded robe. The other, hand on her knife, was Meera Reed, clad in a green tunic and brown traveling cloak. “Welcome again,” she answered. 

Tyrion shot Brienne one look of doubt, before strolling to Meera. “So it would seem, my lady.” Brienne could not help but grip the hilt of Oathkeeper. 

In silence they followed Meera and the hooded figure up a forested hill. Each tree a thick ancient weirwood, each carved with a face. Their red branches shaded the pathway and added to the cold. Tyrion’s breath frosted around him as he struggled to keep up. They were taken to a small village of mostly wooden huts. In the growing dawn light other hooded figures went about tasks, gardening, repairs, woodworking. A single stone structure stood upon a hill, a small keep, moss covered, one crumbling wall thick with ivy. Brienne wondered how long it had stood. Inside they were taken to a room with a hearth containing a warm fire and given a thick tea to drink, bread and cheese to eat. 

Brienne could tell Tyrion was just about to burst from the silence. “Are we hidden here?” He angled his head upwards, as if he could see the eyes of the Three-Eyed Raven searching for them. 

“He can not see here,” Meera answered. 

“For the moment, at least,” said a third person as he joined them. A figure dressed in green robes and a horned wooden helm. He took off the helm to show an ageless face, dark hair and a thick beard. 

“A green man.” Tyrion stepped closer still, awe in his eyes as he studied the tall man and his elaborate helm. 

“It is not the green men we came for,” Brienne said to Tyrion as much as the rest of the room. 

The green man shook his head. “No. You come for their aid.” 

“Yes.” Tyrion let out a shaky breath. “Can they aid us?”

“Perhaps.” The green man almost frowned. “We have felt the shift in balance. You gave him too much power.” His dark steady gaze fell sternly on Tyrion. 

“We did not realize at the time what we had given,” Brienne spoke and drew the man’s attention to her. 

“We do now,” Tyrion added, “and we mean to fix things.”

“Is it still possible to do such?” Brienne asked. For in the years that had followed Bran's crowning his, the Three-Eyed Raven's, influence had strengthened and for most of the realm he had brought prosperity which have them loath to stand against him. 

The man looked slowly from one to the other of them. “We can aid you, they can aid you, yet... much of what may be possible will be yours to do.”

Brienne frowned over at Tyrion, who cocked an eyebrow in reply. Just what did that exactly mean? How exactly could the Children of the Forest aid them?

“Are you ready?” Meera asked, head cocked. 

Tyrion sighed and gave Brienne a look. “As ready as we will be,” she answered for them both. 

Meera nodded, tightened her lips. “Then come. They are further inside.”

They followed her as she went down hallways deeper into the keep, downward through twists and turns and slippery stairs until the mossy stone walls became a cave of gray stone. Tyrion opened his mouth to make conversation and Brienne laid a soft hand on his shoulder to stop him. 

Meera carried a torch, the only light in the surrounding darkness. The pathway angled back up a steep slope, the way slippery as it twisted through narrow passageways of rock creased with white veins of glittering gems. Meera led the way. Brienne took up the rear, making sure Tyrion did not fall too far behind. He sighed from time to time yet shrugged off her helpful hands whenever he stumbled. 

“Are we almost there?” he finally asked. 

“Almost.” 

Then, they turned a corner and it was bright again. Brienne gazed upwards. Cracks in the stone ceiling and walls glowed. It was gorgeous and eerie. Tyrion pulled to a stop before her, and Brienne stepped around him into the larger space of the cavern. 

He tilted his head upwards, his face lit with awe. “Where is this?” he asked Meera. 

“Someplace old, and hidden.” She bent to place the torch into a hole that looked carved from the stone for just such a use. “North of the Wall there was a place similar to this, beneath a giant weirwood still red and living in the harsh cold.”

Brienne walked farther into the cavern. It was as large as the greatest halls she had seen. Wondrous and surprising, hidden beneath the Isle of Faces. Water trickled from somewhere above and an underground stream bubbled. The light was dim but after the dark there was enough to see. She walked farther ahead, her boots slipping on the slippery smooth rocks. 

Meera’s voice echoed. “That was were we found the Three-Eyed Raven.”

“The one before Bran?” Tyrion ambled around the uneven ground to make his way after Brienne. 

“Yes.” Meera followed after them. 

“Who had he been?” Tyrion peered upwards as he walked as in awe at the size of the place as Brienne. 

“He never said his name.” Meera’s footfall was soft behind them. “He said he had waited a hundred years for Bran, while the weirwood grew around him. He wore tattered robes of black, perhaps he had once been a Brother of the Night's Watch.” 

Tyrion looked back over his shoulder at Meera. “Curious, the Night's Watch?” 

“Does it matter who the Three-Eyed Raven had been?” Brienne asked. At the far end of the cavern white pillars rose, twisted and knotted. “He is now what remains of Brandon Stark, named King of the Six Kingdoms.”

As they approached she noticed the pillars were in fact roots, the white slick roots of the weirwood trees above. They wove around each other forming a giant mass that rose from the slippery rock floor to the rock ceiling high above glittering with gems. 

“Be quiet, and still,” Meera instructed as she joined Brienne and Tryion before the pillared mass of roots. Tyrion reached out a hand to a root and she could tell it was killing him not to ask about them, not to comment about it all. But they had come too far.

A face peeked from within the roots, and then another and another. Their skin gray tinted, the knotted hair upon their heads a matching color. Their rounded faces held wide eyes and did give them the look of children, yet there was an ageless look to their faces, knowledge in their green eyes that glowed brightly in the dim light. Eerily it reminded Brienne of the bright yellow eyes of ravens in the nightmares. 

Tyrion overruled by curiosity stepped forward. A single, slim Child of the Forest slipped from the roots, the few others continued to peer out at them. The Child's clothing seemed woven upon her, more twig, bark and leaf than fabric, all in another matching shade of light gray. She stood just a bit taller than Tyrion, her bright green eyes peered down at him and then up at Brienne. 

“I am Fern, in your common tongue,” the Child spoke, her voice musical and sorrowful. “You have come for our aid. For ages we protected the Three-Eyed Raven, before the Night King destroyed the last of us north of the Wall. What become of the new Three-Eyed Raven....” She gave perhaps the most beautiful frown Brienne had ever seen.

“He sees everything,” Tyrion said. “He knows the past, the future, and grows more powerful by the moon.” 

Fern nodded. 

Brienne knelt before her, such that she could look Fern in the face, see her wise ageless features and her intelligent green eyes up close. “We know you have protected the Three-Eyed Raven, yet little magical remains in the world. Once he had the Night King to counter his power. There were giants, and dragons, the magic of the old gods, the god of light, the faceless god.” Much of the faith in such beliefs had leaked from the world since the Long Night. Brienne had seen such in the Six Kingdoms herself, in the North, and had heard of it from more distant places. 

“The age of magic has passed.” Acceptance sounded in Fern's musical voice. A beautiful hum echoed from the faces peering from the roots. 

Tyrion stepped closer to Fern and Brienne knelt before her. “Perhaps, yes.” He furrowed his brow, tightened in his lips, thought of the correct words to follow. When had Brienne grown to know him so well? “But not all the magic is gone, and the magic that the Three-Eyed Raven holds he wields with none to counter him.”

“The Three-Eyed Raven is to watch.” Fern frowned. “Perhaps there is something that could counter him.” Fern looked behind them to Meera. 

“They might know a way,” Meera said. She glanced at Fern, then looked between Tyrion and Brienne with a frown. “They only have the power for one try, one shot at counter the Three-Eyed Raven, and it will be upon you to succeed, or fail....”

Tyrion frowned, tilted his head backwards to peer up at Brienne. She nodded, to him, to Meera, to the bright green eyes of the Children of the Forest. “How?”

“After the Andals the Children knew their end would come,” Fern said. “Slowly we drifted away to the recesses of the trees and rocks, but they cut down our trees in so many places. This isle is one of the free places remaining to us. So, here we took refuge, guarded by the green men.”

Tyrion looked upwards at the roots twisting to the ceiling. “You are in the trees?”

Fern nodded. “Still our powers dwindle as our time does, but we may, together, be able to do one last act. Time is not something we usually meddle with, for to change the past rarely goes well. Yet, the Three-Eyed Raven has done so himself, as well as the future, and you are correct, undeterred his powers will bring about harm to all.”

“Change the past?” Brienne raised an eyebrow.

“Bran was warned by the former Three-Eyed Raven about doing such.” Meera frowned. For she had told them how at least once he had changed the past with Hodor. They suspected he had done something to gain control of the throne. When else had he meddled with time? Brienne tightened her lips as her thoughts went to Jaime. How easy would it have been for the Three-Eyed Raven to manipulate him to return to Cersei and his own death? “But they aren't talking about them changing the past,” Meera added. 

Tyrion cocked his head. Brienne tilted her head and crossed her arms. 

“You,” Fern said, “We should be able to send both of you to before the Three-Eyed Raven took full power, one time only.”

“And then the Three-Eyed Raven just undoes whatever we have altered,” Tyrion said. 

The Child shook her head. “No. Until you have set things right or wrong, the bubble of your altered time will be protected from his actions and his sight.”

“One shot,” Brienne repeated. One try to get everything correct again. “How?” 

“We stop Daenerys and Cersei from clashing. Stop the Battle of King's Landing,” Tyrion said. “If the vacuum of power does not exist, then there is no reason for Bran to step into power.”

“You can discuss it,” Meera said. “Plot.”

Brienne nodded. She doubted she and Tyrion had much time to do such, but a plan of action would make her feel better. Into the past, the thought echoed in her mind. She felt she had finally come to terms with the past, was she ready to go back to it?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love writing dreams, so hopefully the Brienne one works. It's not intended as a foretelling as much as what is on her mind. 
> 
> Going with Sansa here being competent, if only so nothing in the North needs fixing in this epic mess. 
> 
> Much of the Children in the Forest stuff here is from source material, except the time travel. Completely just making that up a bit for the plot to work here. Also, finally to the time travel, which means, Jaime next chapter.


	5. To Slip Through Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tyrion shrugged, sighed, scowled. “Anyone on the throne is better than the Three-Eyed Raven, that above all else we remember and the rest…” He pinched his lips together peered up Brienne. “We hope the rest works out, one way or another.”
> 
> Jaime rode to what would be his death because some part of himself, the dark, deep parts full of self-loathing, believed he deserved such. How was she to save him? To save him and stop Cersei and prevent the destruction of King’s Landing and crowning of Bran all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Finally, Jaime and JB. Of course, this means it may be a bit before we get Brienne&Tyrion back.

Brienne and Tyrion had moved a ways off from Meera Reed, Fern and the rest of the Children of the Forest. Fern crouched, head tilted, listening to the soft, sorrowful song of her brethren. Meera sat upon a rock and sharpened her knife. 

“We just don't give Bran the opportunity to be king,” Tyrion said. Brienne narrowed her eyes at him, for it was he who had suggested such all those years ago. He furrowed his brow in reply, scowled, huffed. “He played me too,” he spoke as he ambled away to think. 

Brienne took a seat on a raised rock, cold and slippery as everything was down here. “We have to back someone instead of Bran.”

“If I could have talked sense into Daenerys, or gotten Jon Snow to do so.” Tyrion ambled back, pacing as he thought and spoke. 

“We back Daenerys as Queen?” Brienne pinched her lips. She knew Tyrion's devotion to his dragon queen had not really waned in the years since he had convinced Jon Snow to do what he could not have. Yet, Brienne was not sure she trusted Targaryns, and Daenerys had still been the one to burn King's Landing, after it had yielded. 

“Would you rather back Cersei?” Tyrion paused to ask. 

Brienne furrowed her brow at that. She knew a bit of Cersei's violence, she was the woman who had destroyed the Sept of Baelor including all the Tyrell's and her own uncle and cousin. “To give Daenerys the kingdom, we must have Cersei back down. Would she? Could she be convinced of such?”

Tyrion shook his head and pulled a grimace. “Or we have them split the kingdom.”

“Neither would agree to such either.” Brienne tilted her head. 

“Curse you and your damn reason-ability.” Tyrion scowled, although his harsh words were not really to her. It reminded her too much of his brother's reaction to her. Tyrion huffed, sighed, came to sit beside her. “We get rid of Daenerys and Cersei,” he finally said. “Back someone besides Bran, anyone, Jon Snow the rightful heir, or Sansa, hell you.” 

Brienne blinked, stared at the gray rock at her boots. “We kill them?”

Tyrion shrugged, sighed. “We aim to talk reason into them first. Mayhaps me and Snow could manage that with Daenerys.”

“And then who talks sense into Cersei?” For Cersei Lannister was not going to do anything Brienne asked of her. If Brienne got near Cersei she would be lucky to not have what remained of the Mountain kill her. 

“Jaime.” Tyrion let out a sigh as he nodded. “Mayhaps she never thought much of his council, but there is no one in the realm who might be able to know and convince her to give up the throne, or share it. And... if he tries to do so after having returned to her.” He peered up at Brienne. He asked her to help the man she loved returned to his former lover and aid her, save her. 

She blinked over at Tyrion, who frowned, knowing what he asked. “No one knows Jaime better than you, not even me. And I don’t think there is anyone he trusts more than you.” 

That connection she had had with Jaime ached. For the same words Tyrion spoke were true for her. Tyrion, Podrick and even Davos, all these years had come close, but none would ever hold a candle to how strong her connection to Jaime had been, still was. 

She looked away, blinked back the tears that threatened to fall. “And who kills Cersei if Jaime fails at talking sense into her?” For it was not that Brienne thought herself incapable of such, she was, but what would remain of Jaime’s love for her if she killed his twin sister, his former lover. 

Tyrion shrugged, sighed, scowled. “Any are better than the Three-Eyed Raven, that above all else we remember and the rest…” He pinched his lips together peered up her. “We hope the rest works out, one way or another.”

Brienne tightened her lips, nodded. “You deal with Daenerys. I do so with Cersei. We aim for Jon Snow as heir and king.” 

“The best laid plans.” Tyrion gave a slight chuckle. “Remember one thing,” Tyrion said as he stood, his eyes almost even with hers, “’Love is the death of duty’.”

Brienne’s heart hammered in her chest. If it came to Jaime having to die, again, to save the realm… Could she lose him again? Could she manage repeating all those years of sorrow? She tightened her lips, tried to stop the quiver in her chin. “I know duty well, Tyrion,” she answered. 

‘They make you swear and swear,’ echoed Jaime’s words from long ago, a caged lion covered in dirt. 

Tyrion nodded. “I know. The realm likely will not get a better champion than Ser Brienne of Tarth.”

Brienne rose herself, now standing well over Tyrion. “It did have one once before, Ser Jaime Lannister of the Kingsguard.” Tyrion blinked up at her. If he had a witty response he did not venture it, instead he reached out and took her hand, giving it a squeeze. 

They returned to Meera with grim faces. She nodded and turned to Fern. The Child of the Forest bowed her head. 

“Good luck,” Tyrion told Brienne. 

“The same to you, my friend,” she replied. 

As motioned by Fern, they stepped closer to the tower of rising weirwood roots. The beautiful and sorrowful lyrics of the Children of the Forest rose in volume above then, then around them. Brienne had no idea of the words, and yet could still sense their ache of a time gone. The dim light overhead flickered and intensified. The music vibrated through them. Meera stepped farther away. Tyrion reached out and grabbed Brienne’s hand. Her other hand gripped Oathkeeper, her anchor, her remaining connection to Jaime. Yet she traveled to the past, back to him, in the chaos of the moment she could not wrap her mind around such. 

The light become blinding, as bright as summer sun, a contrast to the air as chilled as the depths of winter. The music encased them, sung from the thousands of Children of the Forest who had joined with the weirwoods upon the isle. Her skin tingled and she felt pulled and stretched. She clung to the warmth and solidness of Tyrion’s hand in hers. 

The world fizzled out of focus. Goosebumps rose on her skin and sweat dribbled down her back. Tyrion’s fingers slipped through her own. The world spun and swirled and she could make sense of nothing she saw or heard. Her stomach lurched. One last long loud note rang. Then, Brienne found herself falling and flying. She landed with a thud that took her breath and the world narrowed to darkness.

#

When Brienne awoke, head pounding, she knew exactly where in the past she had landed. Tears streaked her face and she felt the sobs that racked her body. She was in Winterfell and Jaime had just left. She remembered having cried half the night, not because he chose Cersei over her, but because happiness with her had not been enough to keep him at Winterfell, to keep him with her. 

She wiped away her tears, her face and hands wet with them. She let out a deep breath as she straightened. Her pain felt close and fresh and raw, yet at the same time it felt numbed and healed, a decade had passed and she had made peace with Jaime’s choice, with his flaws. 

Curse the Children for bringing her back to this moment. Yet, it made for a memorable day, for she knew exactly where she was, exactly where Jaime was. She stood on legs more unsteady than she thought. 

For the realm, she told herself, even as she looked at the rumpled bed and remembered what had been her last time with Jaime mere hours before. She had etched that last night into her memory, the way they had moved together when joined, the way his hand had gripped her close, his lips upon her neck and breast and lips. They had made love rough and full of need, which later rang painful in showing how much Jaime did not wish to leave and that he had already made up his mind he was going. Eventually she had sat astride him, taking her pleasure. He had sat up, surprising her, had wrapped his arms around her and shifted her into his lap. They had moved, joined as one, breath upon each others faces as they moaned and kissed through their growing need. She had wished to stay forever in that moment, and perhaps if she knew what would come next she would have desired it more so. Their peaks did finally come, slow and deep and blinding. Afterwards, Jaime had clung to her, had rested his face upon her shoulder. She had thought the wetness from sweat, at the time, afterwards he had always wondered if instead it had been tears. Similar to the tears that almost fallen when he told her all his deplorable acts before he left, perhaps like tears he had cried again on the road south. 

She paused to curse herself for feelings she’d thought gone, feelings of longing and want and hurt all wrapped up in the love of a man gone. Gone, but right now alive and breathing and riding south to his doom. 

It took little time for Brienne to dress, pack and arm. She should wake Pod and tell him where she went, but then she would have to convince him to stay here, out of the way of whatever she rode towards. She owed it to Sansa to explain herself, but how did she do that? Bran was here, watching and looking. What she did was out of his visions only because of the power of the Children of the Forest. Instead, she sat and penned a short note. She said little besides Jaime was going south and that she needed to follow. Truth. And yet, it left out why. They would assume it was for love, and would not be entirely wrong. Duty, she reminded herself, first must come her sworn duty to the realm. 

Within an hour she was armed and mounted upon her bay and headed out the gates of Winterfell. She could have ridden hard enough to catch Jaime then, that night. Yet, she did not. Nor the days and nights following. She trailed him down the Kings Road, always a hill or two behind. Finally, after they had crossed the neck, she worked up the nerve to show herself. 

Jaime had staked his horse and made camp in a patch of trees. He was bent to start a small fire when Brienne walked her horse into the clearing. He startled, the firestarter dropped and his sword out. 

“Brienne,” he sighed out as he noticed her armor. “What are you doing here?” His brow furrowed. 

It had been too long since Brienne had seen Jaime. He was more gorgeous than she remembered, even in his plain red leather coat and dark traveling cloak. It took her breath away and took every ounce of her power to not run to him, embrace him, kiss him. 

He’d cocked his head, sheathed his sword, before Brienne found her voice. “You asked if I could run from a fight,” she spoke and shook her head. “Just as you, I can not.” Yet, this was not a fight for Jaime, but a fight to crown someone without the immense and perhaps ill-used power King Bran held. 

Jaime strolled to meet her, shaking his head. “But this isn’t your fight.”

“Is your happiness, our happiness, not my fight?” She tilted her head. Her heart beat too fast in her chest at just his closeness. By gods, why had she not gone after him then, a decade past? 

“I chose Cersei,” his words were likely meant to be hateful, but they came out too filled with angst. Yet, he had chosen Cersei, to go to her, to try and save her, to die with her. Brienne had written as much in the White Book, ‘He died trying to save his queen.’ His queen, and his former lover and his twin sister. 

She tightened her lips. “You will have to say worst than you did at Winterfell to dissuade me.” He blinked up at her in reply. “I knew of those past deeds. I know you are a flawed man.” She stepped closer and with her free hand reached out to his cheek. “I know you have past deeds you must eventually face.” A decade of stories and information from Tyrion and rumors in the Red Keep and she knew this all better than the younger Brienne who appeared to stand before him. 

Jaime looked down at his feet, let out a long sigh. 

“Tyrion told me about the babe,” she whispered, a truth as Tyrion had told her, just not at Winterfell. 

His gaze jumped up to hers, face stunned. “I….” He shook his head. “I should have told you, I...” He stepped away and ran his hand through his hair, frowned, sighed.

“It’s your child,” she said, nodding. She wanted him to tell him that was it, this secret he’d kept from her, that he returned to protect this child. He’d had three other children he had fathered and lost them all, choosing his unborn child made sense. Yet, would that make it any better, or different?

Jaime tilted his head, tightened his lips and furrowed his brow. “Were it that simple.” He shook his head. Tears formed in his eyes, yet did not spill. “I don’t have words to explain….” Which made sense, Cersei had always been a power over his life, had a power over him, perhaps he did not understand it enough for words. 

He stepped closer again. “Go back to Winterfell, Brienne.” His voice was the one pleading now. “Please. Do not follow me. Do not add your death to the wrongs I have wrought.” 

For a moment, Brienne paused. So it was not about the baby, perhaps not even fully about Cersei. Jaime rode to what would be his death because some part of himself, the dark, deep parts full of self-loathing, believed he deserved such. How was she to save him? To save him and stop Cersei and prevent the destruction of King’s Landing and crowning of Bran all. 

She shoved her doubts away; she would spare them thoughts another time. “No.” Brienne stood before him defiant, as defiant as she had been dripping with water in the baths of Harrenhal. Her hand clutched Oathkeeper, familiar and cold, all these years a reminder of Jaime. “Go ahead, tell me you hate me. Tell me you do not love me.” She raised her chin. “I will not turn back.”

He frowned and shook his head. “You silly, stupid woman.” The words had once been an insult, yet they held none of the sting of one now. She knew his words likely fit her in this moment. A fool, she thought. Then, had not Jaime once jumped into a bear pit to save her, one-handed, unarmed and in rags.

“Death awaits in King’s Landing,” he softly said. 

His death did await him there, possibly now hers as well, but worst awaited them if she did not change things and stop the Three-Eyed Raven. Brienne nodded. “I know.”

She knew from Tyrion that Jaime’s greatest fear had been to lose someone he loved. Tyrion alive on the Wall in the Night’s Watch was still alive. Tyrion alive in Esso to never be seen again, was still alive. Brienne alive in Winterfell after his death would have been peaceful to him as she still lived. He asked that again of her, to turn around and keep herself alive. Yet, she had more than Jaime’s request to think of. 

He pinched his lips together, sighed. Perhaps it was relief in his eyes, perhaps fear, she could not be sure. “I’ll take the first watch, and I mean not rest long.”

Brienne nodded. Yes, the faster they could get to King’s Landing the better. She bedded down while Jaime bent again to light the fire. She did want to kiss him, to do oh so much more. For she had missed him, more than she thought she would. ‘Love is the death of duty,’ she remembered Tyrion saying, words quoted to Jon Snow from Aemon Targaryn. ‘You you had to chose?’ Tyrion had once asked her during a late night talk,’ Jaime or the realm?’ She shoved aside the thought, closed her eyes and prayed for exhaustion to take her. 

#

They set a brisk pace to get to King’s Landing, as fast as their horses could stand. They rested for only a bit each night and took turns at watches. Brienne held no qualms of such. The sooner they arrived before Daenerys set the city afire with her dragon, the more time there was to change actions. 

Jaime had become gloomy and barely talked besides necessary comments. Brienne let such linger too many days, in part because faced with a living breathing Jaime she was overcome with emotions. Partly, this Jaime, dark and brooding with his flaws so near the surface was such a different version of the man she had loved and remembered all these years. 

“Do you have a plan?” Brienne looked up from skinning the rabbit she had killed for supper.

Jaime had already fettered the horses for the night and now sat upon a log. His arms crossed before his chest, his gaze at the bare ground before the fire Brienne had started. 

His gaze slowly lifted to her and he frowned, gave no reply. 

Brienne sighed and her hands paused. ‘Do you mean to save Cersei? To kill her?’ that is what Brienne wished to ask, but the words stuck in her throat. Did he just mean to go and die with her. “Should we not have a plan?” she finally asked. Though in truth even if it was most of what had circled in her head for days, she herself did not know what her own plans were. 

Jaime shrugged a shoulder, sighed. “Cersei...” he started, his mouth opened and closed, his brow furrowed and finally he lips drew closed in a tight line. 

Brienne laid down the rabbit and her knife and sat back on her haunchs. “I know I… do not know what is between you and Cersei.” She sighed. “But I have never denied it, or meant to not… accept it.”

He nodded as she spoke. “I love Cersei, but it’s all wrong, twisted, and not just because she is my sister.” His brow furrowed again. “Mayhaps you should understand more of it.”

“Mayhaps.” She did understand some of it, from Tyrion. One late night when her courage had been bolstered by too much wine she had asked Tyrion what he knew about his siblings and their affair. What he’d relayed to her had been interesting, things she had guessed at, some she had not. 

Whatever Jaime and Cersei shared had been born of the tragedy of their mother’s death and the coldness of their lord father. Cersei was the elder, but a girl, meaning Jaime had been the heir. Perhaps jealousy of such fueled her actions. Tyrion had no doubts that Cersei controlled Jaime in an unhealthy way. He did not know when the twin’s had become sexual, but his take was that they may have circled around it for much of their childhood. Tyrion had no doubts that Cersei was the one to convince Jaime to give up Casterly Rock and become a kingsguard, to give up the hope of a family and children who he could claim. Tyrion’s take was that Cersei, her control and the sex she offered had been a balm to Jaime, the same as wine to himself. Jaime for his part had seemed unable to tear himself from her control, even when he knew the evil in Cersei, even when she asked the unthinkable of him. Although, Brienne knew Jaime had gone against Cersei, to help Tyrion, to help her, to help Sansa. 

“You don’t really want to know.” Jaime shook his head. 

“Nothing you say will scare me off.” Brienne was certain of such, even if inwardly she was not certain she wanted to know all the dark depths of the twin’s incest. 

“Do you want to know how I’d step over King Robert passed out from drink and fuck Cersei on their marriage bed? I cockolded a king because Cersei wanted me to give her golden lion cubs, but they were never mine, of that she made certain.” A sneer grew on his lips, but he did not look away from her. Brienne made sure she kept her eyes on him as he continued, “While the Mad King burned men alive, I would think of Cersei and our first night together, of her mouth upon my cock, of her beneath me, of my cock inside her. I’d tell her we were the only two people in the world that mattered. I threaten to kill Robert, the Starks, everyone to be with her.”

He shoved himself to standing so that he loomed over her. “I threatened to throw Lord Edmure’s infant son over the walls of Riverrun and confessed my love for her, as if I could shout it to the realm. She came to me in the White Tower after she had told father of us, knelt at my knees, kissed me, said she wanted only me. That was all I needed for my cock to harden, to throw the White Book to the floor and take her on the table in the White Tower.” 

That did make Brienne’s gaze falter. To have defiled such a place, one she knew he held in regard. Jaime stalked around the fire to stand before her. “Why do you love such an evil man?” He crouched before her. 

“After she killed Tyene Sand and left Ellaria Sand to die slow and painful, she came to me, as high on power as the Mad King when he’d rape his queen wife and sister. I was drunk and when I denied her she fell to her knees and mouthed my cock, and curse me I wanted her, I wanted to fuck her, to wake in the morning beside her. I wanted to marry her.”

He shifted closer and Brienne turned to him, their faces were inches apart, his breath upon hers as he continued to speak of his deeds. “I fucked her in the sept at the Red Keep, Joffery’s dead body laid in state above us. I pushed her to the ground, ripped her underdresses. She said ‘no,’ but she didn’t mean it, she was wet and ready when I thrust my cock in her. Falsely given control, because the control was always Cersei’s.”

Jaime shook his head. “I stayed with her when she blew up the Sept of Baelor. When her actions may have played a role in Tommen’s death, my baby boy, my last chance at fatherhood.” 

Tears fell from Jaime’s eyes. Brienne cupped his head between her hands as he looked away. “You have done good against her as well,” she whispered. He tried to look away, even as their closeness and her hands prevented it. “You freed your brother, despite Cersei wanting him dead. You gave me a priceless Lannister sword and armor and sent me to find and protect Sansa, despite Cersei wanting her found and killed. You met with me at Riverrun and promised I could take the Tully forces north, despite them being your enemies, despite that they would aid Sansa. However you did so, you took Riverrun with little bloodshed, and kept your oath to Lady Catelyn to not take arms against the Tullys. You went north and fought beside me against the dead, despite Cersei’s wishes.”

Jaime gazed at her, sadness in his eyes, a frown on his face. 

“You are not only the man who has done evil for Cersei,” Brienne continued. “There is more to you than the man Cersei controls. And I love all of you.”

Then his lips were on hers, rough and full of desire. It took her breath away. One of her hands drew him closer. His hand knotted in her hair. 

Jaime pulled away and rested her forehead on hers. Worry filled his eyes and furrowed his brow. “She’s going to be the death of me,” he whispered into Brienne’s face. 

Brienne swallowed, because returning to Cersei had been his death. ‘Not this time,’ she wanted to say. ‘Not if I can help it.’ But she couldn’t say that, couldn’t explain it all, a decade without him, how her heart ached because of that time without him. How she ached for how much she needed him now. 

Instead, she gripped the back of his neck and pulled him into another kiss, as full of need as his had been. It had been too long since she had done this, felt his lips and his tongue, his hand in her hair, running down her back. She knew she had missed him but she had not know how strongly until now. It was as if she’d been starving for the past decade. 

Brienne found herself unlacing his jacket and shirt, undoing the straps to his golden hand and tossing it aside. She pushed him to ground, her hands tracing every inch of his bare chest. He fumbled with her own jacket and shirt until Brienne made quick time of divesting herself of them. She straddled his waist, ground herself upon the hardness she found there. 

“Gods, Brienne.” Jaime moaned. His hand tugged at the laces of his pants. Brienne lifted herself to slip out of her own pants. 

Then she was atop him, his cock inside her. She rode Jaime, hands flattened on his chest. It was rough and raw, as if she could love him enough to fix him. His eyes widened and his hand dug into her ass, hard enough she felt his nails He seemed not to care how strong her need was. 

Jaime lifted himself so he could suck at her tits, could kiss the space between them and on up to her neck. She felt herself tighten around him, her release already too close. His hand rested on her neck and pulled her down for a deep, sloppy kiss, lips and tongue dueling as their bodies thrust against each other. 

“Jaime,” she groaned. She was so very close, just there on the edge and it was glorious and great and frightening. His hand snaked between them to above where their bodies joined, his thumb stroked her clit and that was all it took. Her climax crashed around her. She tightened herself around his cock. She heard Jaime roar. He held her close with his stump as he spilled within her. 

Brienne collapsed atop him. Both their breaths hot and labored. Jaime wrapped his arms around her, kissed her shoulder. They stayed such until the chill air become too much on their exposed sweaty skin. Then, they hurried back into their clothing, Brienne helping Jaime with some of his laces. 

“You’re the best thing I’ve had in my entire life,” Jaime whispered as Brienne finished with the last of the buckles on his jacket. “Better than Tryion, or what I remember of my mother. Better than the joy when I was first knighted, or the honor I felt when the white cloak was laid upon my shoulders.”

Brienne looked at him. It was not a declaration of love, yet perhaps it was more than that. 

“If I ruin you,” his voice become even softer as tears gathered in his eyes. Brienne wrapped him into a hug, held him tight. 

“You will not ruin me,” she whispered into his ear. 

When he pulled away, there was a sad smile on his lips. Jaime would not ruin her, of that she felt sure. Yet, fear gripped her that perhaps despite everything she might not be able to save him. She swallowed and pushed away the thought. 

Whatever Jaime saw in her eyes, he opened his mouth to ask about. Then, his stomach grumbled loud enough they could both hear it. 

Brienne gave a light chuckle. “Dinner?” She turned back to the half skinned rabbit she had left. 

Jaime nodded and gave a small smile. “I’ll make sure the horses get something.” He rose and strolled to the horses in the darkness. Brienne watched him recede, her heart aching. Even if she could not save him, how could she live herself without him?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have addressed the Cersei show pregnancy before. Here I am going on what was mentioned in dialog. Jaime and Tyrion both believe Cersei to be pregnant and seem not to be questioning that fact (even if they so should have).


	6. Traveling Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As Brienne and Jaime continue south, they grow closer and yet have more questions.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Another installment. Hopefully I have momentum to work on this more.

That first time had broken whatever distance they held. They still made their way south as fast as their mounts could travel, and they did talk more, of possible plans, some of Cersei and Tyrion and even a bit about his lost children. In the quiet of nights and mornings and sometimes even in rests during the daylight, they seemed unable to keep their lips and hands off each other. 

Most of the bedding Brienne had done before had been in a bed. She did not think herself an expert in such matters at all. She had only been with Jaime and only for that one moon in Winterfell. Much as they had explored each other then, there was certainly still a lot about such she had left to learn. 

She had learned how hard ground beneath her felt with Jaime’s hard muscles thrusting into her above. She had learned how she cared not what flesh she might bare to the surrounding forest when she needed Jaime’s touch. She had learned how comfortable being cradled upon Jaime’s chest could be compared with the hard ground. 

She had again remembered how she could long for Jaime’s touch, his hand and his cock. Once such thoughts had put a blush upon her cheeks and thoughts of how she had disappointed her father and even her former septa with her actions. Perhaps it was age or time apart, but she worried none now. She had packed the moon tea from her room in Winterfell and she brewed a cup each morning with their breaking of fast. What did vows matter when they may not survive their current task?

They stood against a tree, and she had never thought such could stand in so well for a wall. She only remembered the once in Winterfell when they had used a wall, her pants around her planted foot, her other leg hiked over Jaime’s ass, his breath hot upon her neck. Brienne rotated them, her now before Jaime, his back against the hard bark. The angle was off, yet because she had a bit of height on him, it did work. 

“Gods, Brienne,” Jaime moaned against her neck. 

“What?” Brienne blinked, tugged for a moment from her desires. 

“Don’t stop,” he hissed. She thrust her hips upon him and the awkwardness wore off quickly. She gripped his shoulder for leverage, Jaime lifted her left leg with his stump, his hand dug into her ass to tug her against him with each of her thrusts. 

It turned her on, how much she turned him on, his gasps and moans. Daylight flickered through the branches overhead, in the distance the horses whinnied. How often had they done this in the open, yet today being so exposed deepened the need between her legs. She clinched around Jaime’s hard cock within her. Her hips slammed into his, her mouth found his and her tongue dueled with his. Their joinings were not always such a battle, yet she would be lying if she did not admit she enjoyed it when they were. 

Her mouth stole his moans and finally his scream as he emptied himself in her. Jaime’s hand slipped to her swollen nub at their junction. It took only a touch and Brienne threw back her head and screamed as her release coursed through her. 

For a moment they clung to each other, Jaime slumped against the tree and Brienne against him. Deep breaths, pounding hearts, sweaty skin, gods she had missed this as much as the sex itself. The horses whinnied again. The sky began to darken and they still had much road to travel before they stopped for the night. Reluctantly they parted and began to redress. 

“Gods, woman.” Jaime let out a shaky breath and ran a hand through his hair only making it look somehow better. 

Brienne’s fingers paused on the straps of her jerkin. “What?”

He waved a hand at the tree they had just… been against. “I wasn’t even aware one could do that, much less how much I’d want to.” He gave a light chuckle. 

Brienne furrowed her brow. “You were the one who taught me that we could… against a wall. Surely you remember.”

“Yes, yes.” He nodded. “I remember. I know…” He tightened his lips and struggled to do the buckles of his leather jacket. “I just didn’t know… I hadn’t thought about how you could… that I could be the one against the wall.” He frowned. 

Brienne dipped her head and fastened her sword belt before retrieving the horses, leaving Jaime to do the rest of his own dressing. He had not thought such was possible, because he had not ever thought about having sex with a woman oddly larger than himself. “Of course,” she called over her shoulder, “you have likely taken Cersei against many a wall.”

He narrowed his eyes. “It would be easier to count the walls in the Red Keep I have not taken her against than the walls I have.” 

Brienne kept the frown from her face. She paused with the reins to both horses, while Jaime fought with his buckles, gave up on the top few and then fought with his belts. Perhaps he jested, she could not completely tell. He did not know how well she knew the Red Keep, how she currently was seeing so many of its private nooks and crannies in a new light, her imagination jumping to Jaime holding Cersei against a hidden wall, her beautiful legs wrapped around his waist. 

“What is sex with Cersei like?” Brienne found herself asking. 

Jaime looked up from fastening his belts to blink at her, his forehead furrowed. He shook his head, grimaced. “Why would you want to know that?”

“I have only ever been with you,” Brienne said, her chin tilted up. “And I mean to be with no others.” For she had not, and perhaps she had used your Kingsguard vows to make certain of that, but could she have really found and married another after Jaime, or taken another lover?

He gave a frown at that, although had not he himself only ever been with two women? Jaime mounted up. “Different,” he replied over his shoulder as he started his horse at a walk. 

Brienne mounted herself and quickly caught up to ride beside him. “How? Because she is… gorgeous and I am--”

“No,” Jaime sharply stopped her. “No,” he repeated softer. “It’s not anything about how… physically different you are. You are everything she is not, and she is everything you could never be.” He gave her another frown, and a sigh, likely hoping the line of conversation was over. 

Brienne thought on that for a moment. She remembered how Tyrion spoke of the control Cersei had on Jaime. It was something she could not do, control him against his wishes, even if she had the power to do so. They rode in silence for a time, each with their own thoughts. 

“With Cersei it has always been give and take.” Jaime’s voice so quiet the plodding of the horses almost washed it out. Brienne turned to him, she knew who usually gave and who tended to take. Jaime continued to look ahead at the road. “You surprise me with how… physical sex with you can be,” he said softly. “But even when we do something like… it is still something we share, the pleasure, the experience.”

“Why should it not be?” Brienne furrowed her brow. Was not wanting to share part of whatever being imitate with another was about?

He turned to her, his lips in a half frown. “Cersei and I always said it was us against the world, together.” He sneered. “Yet she didn’t really give a fuck about what I wanted, who I was.” 

Brienne wanted to say he had deserved better than Cersei, yet the words did not escape her lips. “I care,” she finally managed.

He nodded, sighed. “I know.”

They again rode in silence for a time. Birds chirped in the distance. The horses’ hoofs clopped. Leather creaked from their saddles. They rode until darkness set and a bit beyond, then they made camp with a silent efficiency. Brienne kept wondering if she should speak, what would she say.

They had sat to eat their dinner of bread and cheese, when Jaime finally softly spoke. “In some ways Cersei is rather like father,” Jaime said, softly. He shook his head. “I don’t know why I never saw it sooner. Father never loved any of us, not even me, his golden heir. We were just players in his game. He never imagined we could have separate thoughts and desires aside from those he foresaw. It was his undoing, our unpredicted actions, us showing our true desires.” For the powerful Tywin had been killed by the son he had always scorned, set free by the son who could not allow his brother to be sentenced for a crime he did not commit. 

Brienne watched Jaime in the flickering light of the fire, thin beard upon his chiseled jaw, the shadows emphasizing the lines upon his face and making him look more beautiful despite his aging. His eyes focused on the embers. Her father loved her, however Brienne had failed him as a proper heir, even when she had chosen to join the Kingsguard, she never doubted his continued love. What had it been like for Jaime and Tyrion with a father who did the opposite? 

“I always believed that Cersei loved her children, our… my…” He shook his head, frowned. “But she didn’t... really. She loved the power they gave her as princes and kings, the youthful echo of her own beauty. She loved them when they obeyed and did as she desired them to. When Tommen died, my baby boy,” he paused, voice cracking, shook his head as if to stop it, “she didn’t care, didn’t care because Tommen had become his own being, and he, unlike myself, knew how trapped he was with her.”

“Did I ever tell you I told Myrcella?” Jaime lifted his eyes to Brienne’s. 

She cocked her head. “Told her what?”

“Told her… I was her… father.” He shrugged. “Or attempted to, as we set sail from Dorne. She already knew, said she had known for a long time.” When they had set sail from Dorne. Brienne as most in Westeros knew that the princess had died in route back to King’s Landing, poisoned by Ellaria Sand for the Lannisters part in killer her lover. But, Jaime had never spoken more on the details. 

“At least one of them had the proper Lannister smarts,” Jaime continued. Brienne had never meet the princess. Myrcella had been away during Brienne’s short time in King’s Landing and the only words she had ever heard Tyrion or Jaime speak of the princess was beautiful and sweet. 

“Myrcella,” Jaime sighed out. “Not really the sweet innocent thing Cersei imagined her.” He tilted his head away, swallowed. “Instead… she was smart, loyal, likely cunning had she lived, beautiful.” He lifted his eyes again to Brienne’s. “Actually she reminded me a bit of how I remember mother.” Two women taken from him too soon, Brienne thought. 

“She told me she was… glad I was her father,” Jaime whispered, his voice cracking. “She hugged me.” Tears gathered in his eyes, his voice rough. “It was the only time I ever hugged any of them. And it was…” Tears fell down his cheeks. “Then the poison took affect… and she….” A cry racked his strong shoulders, as he was unable to finish the last. 

Brienne rushed forward and wrapped Jaime in her arms. He crumpled against her chest, his tears and cries coming unabated. To have had such a moment of joy and acceptance ripped away from him. Brienne closed her own tear filled eyes. 

The sudden thought sprang to her mind that she could give him a child of his own, one he could claim, properly father and love. A silly, girlish thought as they rode towards their likely deaths, besides wifehood and motherhood were not things her future held for her. What would she know about either?

Finally, Jaime’s cries petered out. Face still buried against her chest, Jaime whispered, “I never told that to anyone before, not to Cersei, or Tyrion, or Tommen.” 

Brienne hugged him tighter and dipped to give the side of his head a kiss. “Thank you for sharing it with me.” 

“You’re my elixir of truth.” He huffed out a laugh against her neck. And it was correct, it seemed she often brought hidden truths and secrets from Jaime. 

“No,” Brienne replied, “I, above many others, hold your trust to hear long hidden secrets.”

He leaned back away from her at that, lips pinched, head cocked and eyes narrowed. Had she said too much? “Yes,” he finally whispered with a nod, “yes.”

Jaime trusted her with his truths and secrets. The longer this continued, her time back with Jaime, the deeper her omission cut. Omission that she was not truly his Brienne, the secret she kept about her true reason to be here, her true plans against the Three-Eyed Raven, about the lifetime she had spent without him. An omission that cut deeper and deeper and yet, she could not risk telling him and losing him again. She had to be strong to destroy the Three-Eyed Raven, and she could not do that when losing Jaime broke her again.

#

It had been a good few weeks of hard travel through the Neck and then the Riverlands. Jaime had knew the distance to be traveled when he had headed out from Winterfell. How many times had to ridden it now? Most of that time had been with Brienne, not the first time they had traveled together through the Riverlands, and yet now so much had changed. Part of him would state the difference lay in the shift between them having given into their carnal desires, but there was so much more than that. More and more, Jaime realized the depths of his emotions for Brienne. It was all so different than anything he had ever felt for Cersei, larger and stronger and so much more scary. Not the least for what they both might find in King’s Landing. Riding to his death, he could accept, but Brienne riding to hers…

They had made it just into the Crownlands and Jaime had convinced Brienne one night in an inn, with a proper warm meal and wine, bath and a real bed, would do them both good. He knew of a place, loyal enough to the Lannisters to be safe, that last being the bit that had finally made her nod her head in agreement. 

Brienne saw to the horses while Jaime procured a bed for the night with the innkeep. He had just entered the loud and crowded tavern room, scattered with Lannister troops in red and gold, when he heard a chuckle behind him. He knew that voice, one that he had once been welcomed and now sent a chill running down his spine. 

Jaime turned, calm and smooth, despite the sweat gathered in his only palm, to find Bronn leaning at a table, ale in hand and a leer upon his face. 

“You get bored up north?” Bronn asked, raising an eyebrow. 

Jaime ignored him, sat himself at table and waved down a tavern wench for two ales and two meals. This man had been sent to kill him, and Jaime did not like that there was no way to stop Bronn from seeing Brienne. At least the two of them could take Bronn in a fight. Bronn was just about to ask who the other meal was for when Brienne entered from tending to the horses. 

“At least it will be a bed for the night,” she said as she sat beside Jaime. Finally her attention turned to Bronn and his delighted leer. “Ser Bronn.” She nodded her head, all formality after a quick moment of faltering. 

“Ser Brienne.” Bronn made sure to emphasis her title, while giving Jaime a knowing glance.

“We mean no trouble,” Jaime said. 

Bronn waved a hand at the food and tankards of ale that had arrived. “Got coin for another ale and meat pie,” he said, cocking his head, “I won’t mean ya no trouble neither.”

It was Brienne who took a coin from her purse to give the tavern wench for Bronn’s ale and meat pie. Jaime tried to keep the frown from his face. It wasn’t a bloody meal the man wanted. 

“Rumor says your sister felled a dragon.” Bronn took a deep tug on his ale. “Ya headed back to aid her in winning.” He raised an eyebrow, such went against their bargain. 

Jaime took too long to answer, “No.” Although what was he doing then? Cersei was possibly beyond saving and he was never going to convince her to give up the throne much less leave King’s Landing. Bronn narrowed his eyes. Brienne did not look with questions to Jaime, even if she likely had some. 

“We had a deal.” Bronn waved a hand between himself and Jaime. “Me, you and your brother. Your sister made an offer and that cunt brother of yours countered, with double.”

Jaime frowned. He wasn’t sure he had it in him to lie and sweet talk the sellsword, and yet he knew he did still owe the man. 

“You will get what you were promised,” Brienne said, her voice steady and sure. “Whatever the outcome.” Yet, how did she have any idea what Bronn had been promised, and why agree if she did not know?

Bronn shifted his attention to Brienne and narrowed his eyes. “Ya throwing your honorable word into this Lady Brienne? Not sure I give a fuck about your honor.”

“Then don’t give a fuck,” Brienne replied and Jaime tried to not show his shock. 

Bronn gave a chuckle and wink to Jaime. “She mighten be a better fit for you than I thought.”

Jaime narrowed his lips, turned his attention to his meal. The pie was warm, the gravy thick and flavorful. It’d been too long with nothing but bread, cheese and a rare rabbit to eat. The tavern was loud with chatter, clanking plates and the slosh of ale. 

Bronn had left Jaime to his thoughts and instead worked on breaking Brienne, using all his course words and about a half dozen fucks to pry from Brienne any truth of their being together and being in the south. Jaime opened his mouth to step in. He knew how honest Brienne was, and what a horrible liar. Then Brienne spoke before him. 

“We’re on business for Lady Sansa,” she said, words soft yet solid. Jaime blinked and glanced at Brienne. When did she learn to lie? Brienne rested her elbows on the table and leaned forward a bit, easily now inches from Bronn’s face. “Private business, betwixt the Lady of Winterfell and Queen Cersei,” she whispered, “one she did not trust a raven or other messenger with.”

Bronn raised an eyebrow, his mind visually working on just what Sansa might want with Cersei.

“Lady Sansa thought, given his connections with the queen, Ser Jaime would make a good escort,” Brienne continued, her voice solid and sure, her face steady and… seemingly honest. By the gods, Jaime had never, ever seen her give such a lie with that much conviction. Was she really sent by Sansa for some reason? But surely not, for she would have told him, would she have not? 

Bronn gave a chuckle at Jaime, shook his head. “Cersei ain’t gonna be happy to see you, or… her.” He gestured to Brienne. Yes, Jaime had thought on what Cersei would make of him taking another lover back to her. Part of him didn’t care, part of him knew he did not return as her lover, besides rumor had it Cersei had taken up with Euron Greyjoy. But some hidden part inside him was terribly worried about upsetting Cersei, still upset about betraying her still. 

“Perhaps not,” Jaime managed, words clear and seemingly without worry. He sipped his ale, tried not to watch Brienne beside him. The world had hardened her, this Jaime knew even if he had not asked for details. But he knew her, Brienne was honest, always honest, and yet she had lied to Bronn without batting an eye at the action, and she had done it with as well as one with years of skill at it. It tried to rake his brain on how that was, on how seemingly in the short time he had left her in Winterfell she could have changed so? And much as he pondered it, Jaime could come to no good conclusion. If Brienne noticed his confused glances, she barely balked at them, yet more to make Jaime ponder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> When I started this, I had intended to do it fully in Brienne's POV, but think adding in Jaime's POV will help and include some parts that Brienne would not see or some options Brienne would not have.

**Author's Note:**

> I am going with Tyrion not being an ass in this fic, or at least enjoying that Brienne loved Jaime and that he needs a friend in KL. 
> 
> Also, Bran does have a bit of multiple personality disorder in this. I mean he dumped all the past into his teenage brain, some trauma from that seems reasonable. And some of those personalities dwelling in Bran's mind may be rather hidden, dark and vengeful.


End file.
